Thing of beauty
by MicheleChadwick
Summary: Sam and Dean are getting over the aftermath of Mom leaving and heading to a case, that is finally on a beach! Montauk, land of a bucket load of conspiracy theories, five drowning victims, and don't forget the little matter of a dismemberment. But we really have to add a few pranks a long the way. Because a sense of humor in a situation that's messed up, is a Thing of Beauty.
1. Chapter 1

_**Thing of Beauty**_

 **Chapter 1**

Sa-m!" Dean Winchesters green eyes flash open as his hand finds the gun under his pillow, looking for a target before he's even fully awake.

Two deep breaths, as his eyes scan the room for threats and register where he is.

The bunker, his room... home.

Everything is where it should be and yet the dream lays heavy on him, twisting his gut. Images flick through his mind like blackjack cards in a Vegas dealer's hands, Sam hurt, Sam in trouble, Sam yelling his name...

"Just a dream" he mutters reaching for the bottle on the nightstand taking a swig.

Except what if... Ever since the bitch of letters waltzed into the bunker, banished Cas and kidnapped his brother there's a tension in him that he can't shake. Mom leaving only made it worse.  
It's alright when they're on the road when he can look across the room at the bed furthest from the door and know Sam's there.

But here in the bunker they've got their own rooms. Usually that's great, fan-f cking-tastic, but right now it's ... Dean looks up.

He's paced across the room and back twice now.

What he wants is to walk into Sams room and just look at him, but that's stupid. The bunkers warded, they've added extra layers of security, done everything but release attack dogs around the perimeter for Chucks sake.

Wanting to go and stare at his little brother sleep just because he had a bad dream... its right next door to neurotic and needy!

"D mb-it" He's out the door and halfway to Sams room before he's even really made the decision.

If he's quiet, Sam will never know.

He eases into the room silently and crosses the room in two strides to stand looking down at his little brother, sprawled across his bed like an attenuated toddler.

His eyes rove over the planes of his brothers face and he winces at how thin and ragged Sammy still looks, worn thin by too much crap dumped on him. His brother doesn't look like a kid anymore, even when he's sleeping.

That thought twists Deans insides with equal parts grief, guilt and anger as his eyes scan for the vestiges of Sammy the kid brother he's spent his whole life trying, trying to protect...

Except for the hanks of hair falling over half his face, the hair that irritates Dean so much sometimes he just wants to shave it all off.

But to do that would be a weird crime, the hair has been his brothers quiet rebellion or shelter against the world pretty much his whole life.

His hand reaches out to brush the hair out of his brothers' face. Then, a guilty look skews his face and his hand stops; as the thought hits that he's standing here gazing down at his brother like a moony prince in a budget production of sleeping beauty.

Half turning away to leave in disgust at himself.

Momentarily he looks down again, and then a sly smile spreads across his face.

Ideas fill his head and an evil grin lights up his eyes. Silently striding from the room Dean has a plan and things to do.

...

Half an hour later Dean looks down, a smug smile on his face, snaps a few photos from varying angles and congratulates himself on a job well done.

Sam wakes slowly, one hand flails up to run through his hair and finds an obstruction. Puzzled he looks at the thing in his hand. A pink ribbon tied into a bow, rests in his palm.

"What the...?"He rubs his other hand across his mouth and it comes away pink.

A horrifying suspicion coalesces in his mind as he stumbles out of bed and scrambles to the mirror.

"DEAN!?..." he bellows in horror as he surveys what lies before him.

His hair is in two plaits, one unravelling and one still tied off tightly with a bright pink bow. His face...

well now that the pink lipstick is smudged around his mouth he resembles a subdued clown (clowns he hates clowns) or maybe a hooker with a five-year-old makeup artist.

His first reaction wants to be, to storm out of his room and clock his brother. Then possibly force feed him two pretty pink bows. But he's pretty sure that's what Dean wants, him storming in like a tween in a temper tantrum, makeup smeared across his face and unraveling pigtails flying.  
Instead he yanks the last bow off and runs his fingers through his hair to remove the plaits, he wipes at his face with his sleep shirt.  
The person looking back at him still looks like a disheveled tween, only with wavy hair and makeup smears that haven't come off.

Trust Dean to find industrial strength makeup for his art project. Huffing through his fringe at his reflection he stomps down the hall to the shower.

...

"DEAN!?..."

Dean looks up from the laptop screen at the curdled shout from the direction of his brothers room with an anticipatory grin.

"Mornin' sleepin' beauty" he chuckles dryly turning back to the screen, his back to the door, he pretends to be engrossed awaiting an outraged little brother with a vendetta.

The minutes tick by and Sammy doesn't storm out, it appears Sams going to go with the whole revenge best served cold thing, well bring it on little brother!

A dialog box pops up, the search engine first Ash, then Charlie worked on has snagged a possible hunt.

Five drowning deaths in as many weeks in some seaside town, weird storms that just suddenly appear then blow over.

A smile of anticipation flashes, as Dean runs his hand over the back of his neck and keeps digging.

...

Sam walks into the kitchen face scrubbed pink from his shower his stride long and full of contained fury, he glares at his brother, who is (of course) pretending to be engrossed in the laptop.

Finally, Dean looks up at him face blank and carefully schooled to ignorance, but whole oceans of amusement sparkling just below the surface of his eyes.

"How's Mommys little princess this morning?" Dean enquires deadpan.

Sam stops mid stride like he's been kicked somewhere low and painful, his mouth open in shock and his hazel puppy dog eyes doing a world of kicked dog impressions.

"Dean... you didn't" Sam whispers in horror.

Deans mind scrambles back over what he just said and snags on the word Mommy and the penny drops, Sam knows there's always photographic evidence and he thinks that he sent a copy to Mom, the thought hadn't even occurred to him.

... Cas yes, but Mom? That would be cruel.

He'd imagined the puzzled deadpan reply from Cas briefly (maybe something along the lines of "Dean why is Sam wearing female cosmetics?") but Cas was with Crowley at the moment, and it really didn't bare thinking about.

The torment the King of Hell could and would come up with, with something like that as ammo (50 foot billboards maybe.)  
Sam and Crowley had a whole 'thing' going on and it wasn't just because Sam tried to gank him for Rowena.

Realising, he'd been wool-gathering too long and Sam was still looking at him in pale horror Dean raised his hand placatingly

"Nah nah man, I'm not evil" he reassured "coffees on…think I've found us a case."

Sam shot him a bitch face but seemed to believe him, padding over to get two cups, black for Dean...  
Sam stops in front of the fridge in the act of reaching for milk to top off his own cup.

Dean grins, shooting a look at his handy work from across the room before Sam yanks it off the fridge.

The pink bubble writing was a great touch Dean thinks smugly

"Samantha Winchester stars in ... Sleeping Beauty"

Sam stands looking down at the flyer in his hand looking almost puzzled.

"Dean the makeup I get, Mom or ..." he fades off before mentioning Charlie "but where on earth did you get the pink ribbon?"

Dean grins nudging two things on the bench beside the laptop, a small roll of bandages and a pink hi lighter

"Necessity an' invention Sammy, necessity an' invention"

The image of his brother sitting there in the middle of the night, colouring in bandages with a pink highlighter forces a laugh out of him, leaving him shaking his head in a weird kind of wonder.

"Dean imagine if you used that intellect for good..." he mutters rolling his eyes.

"Yeah I could probably save the world or some thin' " Dean deadpans back.

"Speaking of..." he takes a sip of coffee and taps the screen "think I might've found us a case - at a beach nonetheless" a grin lights his face with anticipation. "We're goin' to the beach Sammy."


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N Well this is fun. It's my first attempt at something like this and I've come to the conclusion that actually this is going to take a bit more work than I thought. I come from New Zealand, everything about this story requires research we don't even drive on the same side of the road or use the same unit measurements and they don't even call spring onions spring onions for Chucks sake. I had an idea and did a web search for a small American Surf town and instead found…. (shakes head.) Thanks for the review and the follow and anyone who just read… I've watched others play in the sandbox and wanted to have a go myself. To all you other writers out there I LOVE your sandcastles guys keep it up!**

 **Chapter 2**

"Montauk, Newburyport, Massachusetts" Sam reads the towns name over Deans shoulder "5 drowning deaths in a month ...uh Dean so what? I mean it's a surf town isn't it ... surfing can be dangerous, right?! is this really our kind of thing?"

"Add in the weather signs" he opens and taps the search engine dialog box with a raised eyebrow "Uh and a side order of dismemberment" he adds mildly.

"Dean...Maybe lead with the dismemberment in future, - only one though" Sam muses "but even so, I mean plain old people, kill people and try to hide the evidence. A few unforcast storms aren't exactly..."

But Dean hasn't finished he opens another web page he's been studying. Drowning deaths per 100,000 by state for the previous few years. To make his point he runs his finger down the list.

Massachusetts is right at the bottom.

"0.4 per 100,000, and the population of this burg isn't 100,000 Sammy"

Sam's ready to admit that it could be something, and they've gone out for less, but Dean continues,

"A big chunk of drowning deaths are kids under 4 who die in backyard pools, that's skewed further 'cos "ethnic minority's " he makes air quotes "are 5 times more likely to drown."

"Most adult drownings in natural water are people who can't swim, boating accidents or have a component of suicide or drugs and alcohol. That an' they are usually not locals"

Another swig of coffee and Dean looks up at his brother,

"All the victims are local, -if you ignore slice 'n' dice who hasn't been IDed- there's no mention of alcohol, drugs or suicide, they are all white males in their mid to late 30s one of them a life guard, two serious surfers, the other two... well you get my drift"

Sam looks back at his brother, Dean likes to make a big thing of not being smart.

He's always makes out that research is above his pay grade and here he is setting up the whole thing like a trick shot on a bar pool table. Effortless.  
But if Sam mentions any of that Dean will shrug it off, so all he says is

"Yeah definitely could be something."

"Beach Sammy, said we'd get there" Dean enthuses "I'm gonna shower while you do the geek boy thing an' check it out."

"Jerk do your own homework" Sam groans taking over the laptop. But only because it's expected.

"Na ah Bitch, you got the brains I got the looks" Dean downs his coffee with the parting shot.

Sam sighs and runs his hands through mostly dry hair looking over the info in front of him before doing a google search on Montauk. As if a google search took more brains than sifting through drowning statistics Sam thinks with a shake of his head and a huff.

Part way down the article list things got ... weird...

News reports on the drownings and information about surfing and state parks gave way to talk of monsters and conspiracy theories.

An animal testing laboratory on Plum island rumoured to play host to horrific genetic experiments and an abandoned military facility called Camp Hero that people fervently believed was a top secret government conspiracy meddling with portals to other dimensions. Not to mention the 'monster of Montauk' entry on Wikipedia the whole thing... it was all ... just too much!

"You have to be kidding me" If he didn't know better he'd have said Dean was pranking him.

Pinching the bridge of his nose Sam surveyed the whole package of crazy tied up with a bow of five drownings, a disembowelment and some unseasonal storms.  
Suddenly cooking breakfast seemed like a wonderful idea, because research into this one was something he REALLY wanted to share with his big brother.

...

Dean ambled in with his usual ineffable timing just as food was hitting the plate, he looked dubiously at the eggs,

"Why is there green and red in the eggs Sammy?" he growled helping himself to a side order or bacon and more coffee

"Scallion and tomato Dean, you know vegetables won't actually kill you"

"Tomato's a fruit Sam" Dean muttered shoving an overlarge forkful in his mouth, apparently, it was acceptable despite vegetable and fruit contamination. His eyes took in the picture on the laptop "Sammy what's with the dating site?"

"That Dean" Sam muttered sourly "is the 'Monster of Montauk'" he examined the pink decaying carcass slumped on the sand, the photo wasn't conducive to food consumption, not that that phased Dean.

"Awesome" Dean drawled still eating and examining the photo "Looks pretty dead though. Dude this was 8 years ago," Dean looked both unimpressed and puzzled.

"Look at the rest" Sam said appraising his brother's hair while his brother studied the screen.  
It was definitely lighter. Hiding a smile and the thought that peroxide in the shampoo was a gift that just kept giving. The most amusing part was that Dean hadn't even realized yet. For a second a twinge of guilt bothered Sam as he watched his brother take in the rest of the crazy.

"Well crap Sam!" Dean ran his hands through his hair and rubbed the back of his neck "what the heck are we lookin' at?"

Then he shrugged and grinned "Maybe I oughta change the names on the FBI ID's to Scully and Mulder, you so know you're Scully right!? Let's get this freak show on the road, we're going to the Beach Sammy!"

And that's how it was with Dean, the crazy was just an amusing distraction, the muddy waters were just something he'd muddle through. With a huff, Sam went off to pack.

"Wheels up in an hour Sammy" Dean grinned.


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3**

Dean flashed a look at his brother across the impala as Sam gave yet another huff and raked his fingers through his hair, his eyes were fixed on his cell and his forehead furrowed like he was in pain.

This had been going on for an hour now and Dean had had enough.  
It was 1,700 miles from Lebanon Kansas to Salisbury beach, Montauk, Massachusetts. No matter how you cut it that was going to be 25 odd hours trapped in a car with a Sasquatch steam engine hybrid.

Sammy was angsting and it was palatable in the confined interior, Zeppelin couldn't drown it out and Dean was pretty sure at some point soon 'talk' would happen. Dean ran his hands back and forth over his Baby's steering wheel wanting to delay the inevitable and yet just wanting it over too.

He'd been feeling pretty darned happy about the forth coming road trip and beach excursion. Even the tent and camping supplies that Sam had thrown into the back of the impala didn't phase him too much. He loathed camping, but John Winchester had taught his boys to always be prepared.

Sam was packing the cooler and their gear duffles into the car and Dean was checking Baby's oil and water when a thought hit him,

"Mom!" "Ow! son of a ..." he rubbed his head where he'd bashed it on the hood. Sam met his eyes.

Mom had told them she was going to come home 'soon' when they'd met up unexpectedly at the hunter Asa Foxs wake, she'd also said she needed 'a bit more time.' What ever the hell that meant, apparently more than a couple of weeks, the waiting was driving Dean nuts...  
Dean had to admit their family breakfast together after salting and burning Asa had been a tentative step in the right direction. Since they'd parted ways they were doing better, most days she touched base via text (for some reason none of them ever called, just texts like a bunch of 13 year old girls.)

But every time Dean remembered the whole thing with Billie, he wasn't so sure anything was better - or ever would be- he felt like he was drowning, guilt that what he wanted so desperately since he was four years old had ended up hurting (in some deep fundamentally f cked up way) one of the few people who had actually loved him.  
Somehow he, Dean Winchester, had turned Amaras 'gift' into another thing that imploded. He wondered whether maybe he just wasn't good enough, or worth enough, broken and used up as he was now, to get her to want to come back to them.

The look in Mary Wichesters eyes...

And that meant he hadn't just stuffed it up for him, but Sammy to, and Sam deserved better...

...That look in Mary Winchesters eyes...

Dean grabbed the whole mess of feelings and thoughts that he'd dragged up in that moment and shoved it roughly in a mental box labelled "Leave it the f ck alone" and shoved the lid on.

Nah ah not going there!

Instead he'd deal with the surface issues, they had a Mom now, and vaguely at the back of his head Dean knew you treated Moms different than Dads, different than brothers too, he supposed.

If you weren't a complete screw-up you...You were supposed to tell them you were going places, weren't you?  
And when 'home' was a high security warded bunker full of arcane magic, you couldn't just leave a key under the doormat, and a note on the door.

He really didn't want Mom turning up to the bunker finding no one and nothing, unable to get in, what if she had no money and nowhere else to go... What if she called Billie...?!

Sam saved him from falling any further down the rabbit warren,

"I gave Mom a key at breakfast, Dean. I also texted her about the case and we'll check in and tell her where and when we make stops. It's fine."

A feeling of deep overwhelming gratitude swept through him then, thank God for Sam!

He, Dean, was such an emotionally retarded screw-up, he just never seemed to be up to speed.  
And there was Sam, sorting things, before he Dean, even realised there was a problem. Sam was there, building the bridges and doing the right thing; Damn he loved his geeky, giant, straggle haired kid brother.

...

The rumble of the impalas engine, the road in front of him and his kid brother riding shotgun, life was pretty near perfect.

Except it wasn't, because Sam was huffing like a steam train and trying to rip his hair out in the passenger seat. While glaring at his cell like it had personally offended him.  
It was driving Dean freakin' nuts.

If Sam could build the bridges between him and Mom. Then, maybe, he owed it to Sam to man up and do the whole 'talk' thing.

...

"Seriously Dude! What climbed up your butt and died?!"

Sam jumped and looked up at his brothers outburst.

He blew a huff of air through his fringe and raked his hair back out of his eyes then tossed his phone on the dashboard in disgust.

"There's just, I don't know, too much?!" he said at last.

"What'd ya mean?" Dean answered with an odd careful expression on his face.

"This case..." Sam trailed off trying to think how to explain it to his brother.

"I can't even begin to pin down what we are looking at here, we have the drowning victims, the dismemberment, and your weather signs" another huffy sigh crawled out of his chest. His head was swimming with all the research he'd read, trying to figure it all out. It was like having 4 different 1000 piece jigsaws mixed in one box.

"But then we have this whole sea of crap surrounding it... these conspiracy theories, Plum island, Camp Hero..." he pulled up short because Dean gave a bark of laughter.

"So you've been sitting there huffing like a steam train and practically pulling your hair out, over the case?" Dean clarified,

"Well Dean, its..."

"Sam" his brother cut him off "how about we get there, go see the coroner and look at the bodies like we always do, stop gettin' bogged down in the bigger picture"

"But Dean.."

"Sammy stop being an extra credit, teachers pet, swatty little bitch for a second, sometimes the conspiracy theory nut jobs are actually, get this - nut jobs. Maybe the lifeguards in good Ol' Montauk are just crap at their jobs an' all we'll have to do is sit on the beach, look at hot chicks in bikinis and drink some beer, hell we could even live a little an' build a sandcastle!"

Sam studied his brothers face and swallowed thickly, how did he even begin to explain the overwhelming feeling of drowning and spinning out of control he was feeling ever since Dean had vanished to play suicide bomber.

Toni Bevell had almost been a relief with her knives and torture.

Except, of course she hadn't been and he still woke up gasping sweating and feeling violated.

"Somehow I can't see us catching that break, Dean" he said quietly.

The next thing Sam knew Dean pulled the impala over onto the road shoulder and turned to look at him. Green eyes flicked back and forth over his face searching for something,

"Sammy" he began quietly, almost gently.

"It's Sam" he found himself muttering defensively.

Dean favoured him with a soft smile "Sammy, call me doctor Phil and you know I hate it. But maybe, just maybe, it's time you climbed out of your own ass and talked about some of the crap festering under all that girly hair."  
"Yeah Sammy I know, pot, kettle black, the whole nine yards..."

"It's just... is this ever going to stop... every time I think it can't get harder, more messed up... every time I lose you or we save the fricking world. Or something good happens and we get Mom back... but maybe it isn't good, because It's tearing her apart... " Sam found himself trailing off, panting, eyes brimming with pain and fury.

His brother chuckled humourlessly "Yeah sometimes Billies offer of the big empty doesn't sound so bad, hu?"

"Y-eah."

"You know in Die hard 4, the techno fire sale one..." Sam frowned at his brothers change of track,"John McClane he has this whole speech in there about being 'that guy' the one that gets stuck fixing the crap, let's just say, I identify... No one asked us but somehow, we got designated 'that guy' and I know it sucks, big time. But who else are we going to trust?"

Without another word Dean put the impala back into drive, shot his brother a tired grin and gave Sam's shoulder a squeeze.

Sam found himself smiling back. They hadn't really said anything, but suddenly the tension in Sam's chest was gone.  
For a second they locked eyes.

"Yippee Kaiya mother f cker"

They spoke the words in unison as the wheels spun and the impala ate the miles on the way to Montauk, home of the Montauk monster, 5 drowning victims (one of which was in pieces) and a whole bucket load of conspiracy theories.


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter 4**

They'd been driving ten hours with only a few breaks to fuel man and car when Dean finally decided it was time to call it quits for the day.

It was an old pattern and comfortable as a favourite pair of jeans to them both, all these years of clocking mileage and staying in one cheap worn down motel after another. One would check them in, one unload the car. One would find food while the other showered. The old patterns didn't change, no matter the destination or the town. There was a form of comfort in that.

Dean walked out of the bathroom drying his hair to find Sam enthroned at the laptop once again,

"I swear Sammy that better be porn" Dean griped "If that's another gallery of washed up rotting things, that some crackpot's claiming are genetically mutated monsters I'm going to revoke your internet privileges. Your weird ass fascination with serial killers was bad enough, but come on man, I wanna eat in peace."

"I'm not looking at either" Sam eyed his brother mildly taking in the definite change in hair colour; Which Dean somehow STILL, had failed to notice. He turned back to the laptop wondering how far he really should let it continue.

A moment of guilt flared.

Even when they were on the nations most wanted list, thanks to the Leviathan shape shifters using their faces for a murder spree, the option of hair dye just hadn't entered discussion.

He wouldn't call his brother vain - because surely a vain guy would have frigging noticed by now - but Dean was bound to be thoroughly pissed when he did realise... and pay back was going to be a bitch.

"I was looking into local papers and police reports mainly"

"Anything good?"

"I don't know if you'd call it good, but back in September a guy called Krishna L Parihar aged 24 was charged with impersonating a New York police officer, he was arrested and charged for forcing people off the road (apparently pretending to be a cop)... the charges included criminal possession of a weapon - and _**an illegal ammunition loading device.**_ " His forehead crinkled like that of an unhappy Labrador.

"So, what're ya thinking? Hunter?"

Sam shrugged in response and zoomed in on the photo of a stranger.

"No one we know." Dean muttered around a mouthful of burger "o' course that doesn't mean he's not a hunter - just that we've never run across him. Either way it could be a massive pain in the butt, better make sure all our IDs are your best work tech boy."

"Yeah, done and updated," Sam gestured to the box beside him "there are so many hunters out there we know nothing about." he mused

"Dad always said getting involved with other hunters was too risky..."

"Yeah, I know, too many hot heads and psycos barely more human than the things they hunt. I remember the talk."

Sam pinched the bridge of his nose and wrinkled his brow again.

"She.." meaning Toni Bevell "just couldn't believe we were so disorganised... she spent all that time torturing me trying to get things like organisational structure, who reports to who and dead drops out of me, she mind raped me for craps sake... and for what? Even if I'd caved what could've I really given her? A few hunter's names?! The closest thing we had to organisation was Bobby ... and he's dead" there was a beat of deep aching silence between them at mentioning Bobby.

Sam stumbled on with his thought "She, she said they have the whole of Britain warded, that they know when anything sets foot there and kill it before it even gets a chance to drop a body ..." Sam stared at his brother with eyes like open wounds.

"Yeah that's what the bitch of letters **_said_** Sammy, don't make it true though." Dean frowned "Besides the whole shoot first stich ...not every 'monster' is a monster… Most are, granted... But some are trying really hard to walk the line, like Garth and his family... Little miss Slitherine reject, m-u-c-h more of a monster in my book."

Sam was more than mildly surprised with one thing "Dean, did you just use an actual Harry Potter reference?"

Dean grunted and looked mildly embarrassed "Yeah, got sick of all you geeks and your obscure geek speak."

"And...?" Sam raised his eyebrow questioningly.

"And what, it's set in a boarding school for wizards Sammy, not even a Catholic girls gone wild kind o' boarding school" Dean drawled with a leer. "An actual boarding school with homework an' team sports, and, and old dried up teachers, at least high schools in the real world you have the occasional hot substitute teacher." Sam could see memories of a catalogue of substitute teachers who had fallen prey to Deans -not always unwelcome- attentions over the years.

"So how many of them have you watched?"

"Two" Dean grunted "Six more of the sodding things to go."

"You know Dean, there's probably a plot outline on the Wiki, it's not that big a deal, after all, Jerk, you always say you keep me around for the research."

"Nah man, it's all good, Charlie always ragged me to watch it..." for a second their green and hazel gazes touched then both flinched away. Don't talk about Charlie, an unwritten rule.

Dean rubbed the back of his neck and looked almost apologetic,

"Bitch You need a shower, how bout I go find somethin' cold an' some snacks and you can inoculate me with a booster shot three of geek" Deans offer surprised Sam "...anything to keep you away from your monster porn."

Sam tossed an empty soda cup at the back of Deans head as he headed for the bathroom "Jerk!"

"Sammy always be proud of your hobbies, they make you what you are." A gravelly chuckle followed Sam to the bathroom.

...

The next morning a blood curdling shriek ripped the air, the words that followed were completely unprintable.

30 seconds later a fully dressed and thoroughly pissed Dean stormed through the bathroom door. It crashed back against the wall making the whole room shake and dust shower into the air from the tops of the overhead lights.

Apoplectic fury seemed to shimmer in the air as a panting Dean GLARED at his brother, lost for words. Sam braced himself for Devine retribution, and possibly a facial fracture, hands raised in submission.

"What the f ck Sam!" Deans voice was a hiss of immanent death.

Sam swallowed "It was just a joke..." "Dean I'm..."

The one reaction Sam never expected was for Dean to spin on his heel and stalk out, seconds later the impala's engine grumbled to life and gravel flew as the impala accelerated out of the parking lot.

Sam stood in the centre of the motel room, alone. Looking around in the gaping silence. His shoulders slumped as he took a few deep breaths, unsure what to do. His eyes fell on Deans phone beside his bed with a groan.

"Great, just great..."

 **A/N** **Bwhahaso Deans now pretty much blonde and not at all happy. Sam's stranded and doing a kicked dog impression. Thanks for the reviews follows and reads. I REALLY expected to throw this story out into the internet abyss and have it absorbed silently like a drop of sweat in the ocean… so yeah thanks, you're amazing! And yes, we will get to the beach... but remember it's 25 hours of driving (thanks google trip planner) so be patient. As someone most of us know once said "Driver picks the tunes, and passenger shuts their cake hole" Kidding, please don't! Tell me everything I did right…. and wrong, reviews are the only payment Fanfic authors get and the fuel that turns the wheels**

 **Sadly, I might have to focus on the real world for a day or two… hubby has started muttering about 'the Christmas letter' which as the writer of the family, it's my responsibility to provide. Apparently, Chadwick friends and relatives look forward to it all year (grimace.) Yearly I fill their Christmas cards with humorous tales of the slings and arrows of outrageous autism parenting. Humour in the face of a life that's often pretty much a clusterf*ck… well yeah … it's a thing of beauty!**


	5. Chapter 5

**A/N so we're back sooner than expected because 10 lines into the annual Christmas Letter I received da da dahhh "A Phonecall From The Principal" to inform me "There Has Been An Incident" and "I Was Required"... Autism may speak (at length like a professor/lawyer with more vocabulary than most adults) but autism will not speak to teachers after a meltdown especially not about the emotions and happenings leading up to "The Incident." After using my arcane translator skills, it appears that my progeny did not start it, he was simply trying to dissuade animal (or bumblebee) cruelty by the child twice his size. Unfortunately, his response was (clears throat) ... "excessive to the situation."**

" **Discussions With The Principle", (a lady who bares a striking resemblance to Toni Bevell (blonde, pantsuit, fully believes she's in the right while torturing the innocent)and whom I often fantasise about salting and burning;) have not left me feeling overly Christmassy...**

 **Chapter 5**

Two hours later Sam sat on the bed furthest from the door beside a pile of repacked gear wondering exactly what to do next, the familiar feeling of anxiety clenching his chest.

Yes, maybe he'd let things go a step to far, there was a part of him that regretted that, longed to set it right. But there was also an unbowed part of him that took a sly satisfaction in one upping his smart-ass brother.

He knew that same part of him was responsible for the fractious relationship he had shared with his father, his tendency to pick a battle and be almost pathologically incapable of backing down once the line was drawn.

As a weedy kid it has gotten him bullied and into fights, as a teen that streak of stubbornness had caused him to be on the outside at every new school and a combatant with his father.

It wasn't that he picked fights, no, unlike his brother Dean, who almost gloried in them.  
It was more that he had a trajectory, one that was so focused that it didn't take into account the chaos that ruled the rest of the world.

That same focus had gotten him a full ride into Stanford and out of hunting, he'd left his brother… and that had hurt. But he'd had to.

Besides one of the universal constants was that Dean always came and got him. No matter what he'd done.  
And Sam had done some really messed up stuff over the years, bleaching his brothers' hair blonde was a blip on the radar compared to starting the apocalypse or releasing the darkness...

So Sam waited for his brother to come and get him, there'd be payback, of that Sam was sure. But Dean always came back.

...

The rumble of the impalas' engine brought Sam out of his thoughts.

Sam would rather shatter the world than back down; Dean though, he would tie the world in knots. He didn't back down, he just found another way.

Relief flooded Sam at the sound of his brothers measured pace and tuneless whistle.

Dean walked in looking just as blonde, but languid and smug as a cat.

"Sammy, it would appear it's true what they say, blondes really do have more fun" he announced by way of greeting "And I need another shower" he grinned and tossed his brother a bag. "Got ya some rabbit food" rummaging through his own bag grabbing new clothes and his phone then shutting the bathroom door.

For a second Sam just stared at the closed bathroom door, there were so many questions bouncing around his brain, but he'd be darned if he was going to ask details about blondes having more fun, before 10am, in a town they'd only been in for less than 24 hours.

He had a horrible feeling that part of Deans revenge for the peroxide in the shampoo would be a detailed account once they were trapped in the impala and on the road. With no escape, for hours.

Sam shook his head in admiration/disgust and set about packing the car.

Just before the room door closed Sam thought he heard Deans phone ring from the bathroom.  
Before he even reached the car, his own phone rang.

Juggling the bags in one arm he pulled out his phone.

"Sam, Dean didn't answer his phone, is everything ok" Castiel's gravelly voice began with no preamble.

"Hi Cas, I think he's in the shower, yeah we're ok. Uh, are you?"

"I am finding working with Crowley to be a challenge" Cas informed him solemnly.

"Yeah well, he's a demon, it does sort o' come with the territory Cas" Sam found himself trying to hold back a grin.

"This is true Samuel" Sam could almost hear the gears in Castiels head grinding. "I had hoped to ask Deans advice on how best to achieve success in this collaboration with Crowley"

"Dean would probably suggest holding an angel blade to his throat."

"I have considered this option, but I don't think it would achieve the desired cooperation."

Sam chuckled. "Yes, it would probably be better to appeal to the mutual self-interest thing, he doesn't want Lucifer roaming round any more than we do Cas.' Just don't let him yank your chain too much, ok?"

"Thank you Sam" there was a click as Cas hung up.

...

Dean was out of the shower and dressed by the time Sam returned, "Just got a call from Cas', he wanted advice on Crowley taming, I'm just guessing, but I think the honeymoons over."

"Yep, _**I**_ just got a message from his Royal Darkness whining 'bout 'our bloody angel'" Deans Crowley impression was scarily accurate "I think hangin' with Cas' is cramping his style. Who'd have thunk it?"

"What I'd like to know is why they think we are qualified to give them advice on how to get along." Sam mused as they started another day on the road.

"Well Sammy you may have trouble playing nicely with others, but I seem to make out just fine" he waggled his eyebrows and leered while launching into the tale of his morning exploits.

"Dean!" Sam whined in distress.

...

"I'll get you some hair dye next time we stop" Sam promised as his brother checked his hair in the rear-view mirror again.  
Sam found it disconcerting every time he his mind drifted, he'd jump at the stranger sitting beside him driving the car.

"Nah Sammy it's all good" Dean replied running his hand through his spiked blonde hair.

"But …. you said only girls dye their hair...,"

"Apparently girls dye other people's hair too, Samantha" Dean rumbled with a raised eyebrow.

"Jerk!"  
"Bitch, you oughta know by now, Dean Winchester is so awesome he can rock any look, and draw the ladies! Nancy said the blonde made my eyes greener..." he stated smugly.

"Well I guess the blonde bimbo look is kind of your thing" Sam shrugged turning back to his research.

 **A/N The chocolate fish goes to SpnKs15, Dean always has more fun... especially blonde *grin* Now back to the frickin' Christmas letter before hubby accuses me of dereliction of duties... Or there is another "Phonecall From The Principle."**


	6. Chapter 6

**A/N Hi guys, so I've finally finished the blasted Christmas letter, now there's just the filling out of the cards and posting…. Blah! The things this time of year inflicts on us…. And this afternoon we get to attend the local Santa parade with 4 kids. I always say that Christmas is a time of suffering and irritation. Look at the first Christmas, horribly long road trips, crowds, nowhere to sleep, child birth without drugs, in a smelly old stable….. All just to save a world that doesn't even notice…..**

 **Chapter 6**

"Hey Mama,

Look at me,

I'm on my way to the promised land

I'm on the HIGHWAY TO HELL, Highway to hell..."

Sam looked across the car at his brother as he belted out the lyrics to AC/DCS 'Highway to Hell" and winced Dean was never going to be amongst the country's top singers but Sam suspected that his brother was singing extra painfully, on purpose. If he complained, operation 'Make Sammy regret the shampoo incident" would only step up a notch; from experience Sam knew Dean could make noises resembling a cat going through a wood-chipper if he REALLY wanted to.  
Sam gritted his teeth feeling the muscles along his jawline jump, rubbing his eyes and pinching the bridge of his nose he stifled a sigh.

Dean glanced over at his brother with a smirk, then did a quick double take noticing the signs of an approaching headache written on his brothers clenched face.

Snapping off the music he turned "So what's the plan?"

Sam consulted his notes "First stop, Suffolk county medical examiner's office, we have an appointment with, uh, Stephanie Horowitz, she's a deputy medical examiner. She did the last two autopsies, they're holding the latest Vic for us to view before releasing him back to his family."

"Stephanie? Lady medical examiners are a rare breed, man, I bet she's like 80 with a bun and sensible shoes."

Sam favoured his brother with his bitchface look. "Does it matter Dean?"

Dean snorted "Sam, you do know we're not real Feds don't you? The PC crap, it doesn't start til we enter the building."

"Doesn't start even then" Sam grumbled under his breath.

Deans phone chirped with a text. Sam grabbed it up before his brother could, "Dude hands on the wheel! I'll check it ok!?."

With horror Sam gazed at the wallpaper that had replaced the man of letters symbol on his brothers phone.

"Deeeeeannnn!"

"Awwww, you were so kw-ute all asleep with your wee piggy tails Sammy. I wuvvvv you sooo much whittle sister 'n' just wanna see your shweet face when I look at my phone..."

"I'm so deleting it! Jerk, you can't stop me" he fumed while his brother laughed evilly.

"Quit whining bitch, what's the text?"

"Mom, just checking in. Hu... she made $300 hustling pool last night, d' ya think she oughta be doing that?" Sam looked earnest and worried at the same time.

"Go Mom, Dude, you wanna tell her not to? I'm not gonna."

They drove in silence for a while each contemplating the complexity of the world they now inhabited.

...

"So food, then lady coroner?" Dean was the first to reject contemplation.

"Probably a good idea to clean up and suit up first" Sam humphed waving at both their crumpled appearances from the previous night spent in the car.

"Yeah, shaving wouldn't hurt you any Sasquatch... I really want me some pie first though" Sam rolled his eyes at hearing his brothers priorities were intact.

"You know Dean, next birthday you're going to be th..."

"Sam!"

"And as you age you may discover that..."

"Sam!"

"I'm just saying that..."

"Samuel, I will hurt you!"

Sam chuckled but didn't pursue the conversation further. The things that his brother lived for, they could all start with an F... food, family, fighting... and the other f-word. Dean was a simple creature. At times Sam envied him that..

"I just wish I knew what we were looking at here, that's all"

"Sammy, one step at a time. Clean up, food - and pie. Then old lady coroners and corpses. And t-h-e-n you can geek it up with the autopsy reports and play guess the fuglie."

...

The amazing restorative powers of a shower, clean clothes, food and a waitress to flirt with. Not to mention a pie to go. The sun is shining in the piercingly blue sky and all is right with the world. Well maybe it's not, Dean concedes to himself; But in this moment as Sam tosses his head back and laughs at his stupid joke, whacking his shoulder in affection. This moment between thought and breaths...Well... it sort of is.

...

The Suffolk county medical examiner's office is a large contoured block of concrete with a bank of glass along the front of its facade, a building that has stood the test of time and will do so for another hundred years, it looks no different than any other serviceable government building. Sam and Dean Winchester have seen a lot of hospitals, morgues and coroners over the years.

The woman who greets them as Stephanie Horowitz is not 80, she looks more like 26 with straight shoulder length brown hair and the harried expression on her face, one of a public servant with too much work to do and not enough time to do it in.

Sam watches his brother straighten slightly in surprise and adjust his charm to full strength. The smile he baths Stephanie in is blinding, one that Sam has watched his brother use to melt women, and more than a few men with his entire life.

The lady in question simply swept him with an assessing look and smiled back coolly.

For a second a look of complete shock flares in Deans green eyes, as the remnants of his most powerful weapon tinkled to the floor like so much shattered glass. He covers it well though, all business.

"Thank you for taking time out to help us with our enquiries Miss?" a pause where Deans voice held the perfect note of speculation "Horowitz, I know you must be very busy" usually by this point a lady bathed in Deans regard would be turning towards him like a flower to the sun, whatever her marital status. Usually she would confirm her single status looking eager and flustered at this point.

Instead she turns to Sam.

"Agents?" She enquired making it a question.

"Cassidy and this is my partner Agent Bonaduce" Dean grabbed the conversational reins again flashing his badge, Sam followed suit.

"I'm told you are interested in the drowning cases from Montauk" she spoke over her shoulder as she led them back towards the morgue, heels clicking.

"Yes" Sam looked through the copies of autopsy reports they'd obtained while they waited.

"You did the last two autopsies yourself?" Deans voice was business-like but there was an undercurrent to it.

"Agents why are the FBI interested in these cases?" Again, she addressed this question to Sam not Dean.

A frown pinched Deans forehead and he took a breath to say something Sam could tell would not be polite.

"We are correct that statistically speaking this many drownings are not typical for the area?" Sam phrased it as a question lawyer style "apart from that we are not at liberty to discuss our investigation. Any similarities between the cases, or things that strike you as, odd, would be of assistance." Sam watched his brother reel in his irritation with relief.

"And you want to examine Mr Sessa's body?"

"Yes" Dean rumbled trying yet another engaging smile. "It won't take us long and then we'll be out of ya hair." His eyes held a sparkle.

"Can you please sign the log" not drawn, she gestured to the book and nodded at a rack of gloves.

"If you can tell me what you're looking for it would help, otherwise I imagine you will find the report to have all my findings" she turned away to open the long metal draw. Pulling it out fully and unzipping the body bag she stood back.

"Thank you, Miss Horowitz, we can take it from here, would it be ok if we had a moment of your time afterwards. I know you must be busy" as they both gloved up Sam tossed her a commiserating grin and was surprised to receive a genuine smile in return.

"My office is the third door on the left back towards reception she informed him politely as she left.

Dean let out an irritated huff as he began to examine the white, slightly bloated corpse. "Well she was nice" he grumbled "So what've we got?"

"All the organs are still intact."

"No Werewolves or Lamia then."

"No exsanguination."

"No Vampires, Chupacabra or any of those fuglies then."

Dean ran the EMF meter over the corpse "Nada" he grunted with a sour look.

"Check the ears and nose..."

"Ergtch on it..." finding a swab and fishing round "Nope clean."

"No bite marks or puncture wounds?"

"Hard to tell, I think he was fish food for a while, but nothing jumps out at me."

Sam grunted "No defensive wounds?"

Dean studied the hands wrists and arms critically "there's a couple o' cuts on the back of the hands an' one on the palms, not exactly life threatening though, not defensive."

"Yeah there's photos in both the last two reports of the Vic's hands, nothing flagged as unusual."

"No sign of restraints, strangulation, head injury..." Dean looked frustrated "I think there's a hickey on his neck, so at least he's had more fun than you lately Sammy." His brother shot him a sour look.

"Hmmm salt water in the lungs and a plasma specific gravity that's consistent with drowning, so he was alive when he went under the water, that makes it actual drowning, not just a body dump. Diatoms are consistent with the coastal Montauk waters"

"Dia... what's?"

"Diatoms, microscopic uh" Sam stopped just short of saying organisms "bugs, Dean" knowing his brother would purposefully mishear the word.

"So, the _microorganisms_ " even pronounced correctly there was a leer "matching means they drowned in the sea yes?"

"Yep. Toxicology shows no alcohol or drugs, for any of them. There's still some extra blood work outstanding for the last two cases."

"Mouth looks quite shredded an' uh pink, tongues really swollen..."

"Swollen or shredded soft tissues in the face is to be expected, he was in the water a while, before he washed up. That causes the swelling, the water drags them about a lot which… shreds the soft tissues. Add in sea life…. "

"Yeah, can the descriptive prose bro' I get the picture, hold on a sec', crap this is gross" opening the corpses mouth Dean peered in. "Well that's weird, anything about the tongue there? there are these, like welts on his tongue."

Sam peered over his brothers' shoulder riffling through the reports. "They found cnidocytes in the welts"

"Sin..o'whats? Come on man, English..."

"Googling it dude, hu" Sam raised an eyebrow "cnidocytes are jellyfish stingers."

"So, he French kissed a jellyfish?"

"He might have swallowed it while drowning" Sam huffed and looked irritated.

"Well maybe it's a bust Sammy, doesn't look like our kind of thing. We'll poke around in Montauk but maybe it's a beach trip after all."

"Yeah maybe..." Sam didn't look convinced.

"How 'bout you go say goodbye to your girlfriend, give her our details in case something comes up, an' I'll meet you at the car."

Sam chuckled in amusement "She really didn't seem to warm to you, at all, did she?"

 **A/N now Dean is feeling mumpy so he better do some prank torture on Sammy to make himself feel better, what evil things can you guys think up for me. Zap me a review and exercise your inner Loki**


	7. Chapter 7

**Chapter 7**

Sam tapped on the open door frame of Stephanie Horowitzs' office and ducked through.

"Hi" She looked up from her paperwork, glancing behind Sam, presumably looking for Dean. When she didn't see him, Sam was surprised to see her physically relax.

Sam cleared his throat, amused. "Agent Cassidy had a few things to do so it's just me."

"Oh, so you have some questions?" She pushed the paperwork in front of her away with a look of relief.

"There are a few things, mostly I'm looking for your impressions on the cases." He shot her a dimpled smile. "Anything you feel is odd. Any odd coincidences, patterns or things that just don't feel right."

"Well..." the young coroner looked uncertain and looked down at her hands "We usually get one drowning a year, at very most from Montauk..." "And usually that's an out of towner. Montauk has been getting a reputation as a party town in the summer, so most of those deaths have a component of alcohol or drug fuelled, um, stupidity shall we say."

Sam smiled and nodded in agreement and understanding "But...?"

"But it's a bit early in the season; we've had, what 4? this month and all the men that have drowned are locals ... none of them had drugs or alcohol on board." She shrugged and met Sam's eyes.

"Yes Dean, uh Agent Cassidy pretty much said the same thing." Sam murmured. Immediately Stephanie's face closed up.

 _Damb!_ Thought Sam.

"My job is to find the cause of death Agent."

"Yes, Miss Horowitz, and no one would debate the finding of drowning. Your reports are detailed and concise... we see a lot of reports and yours are...gold star standard" Sam favoured her with what Dean called puppy dog eyes. "Your expertise is why I need your help Stephanie, these men had people that cared about them and they are dead. Maybe it's all coincidence but if it isn't could you live with yourself if you held back information that might help? Just because you were afraid of looking silly. You have the power to make a difference and possibly save a family some grief." He paused and she looked up into his eyes.

In that moment, Sam knew he had her.

"After all, what you tell me can and will remain between us."

Stephanie Horowitz took a deep breath. "There are some things that don't feel right" she admitted. "They could be nothing, but all of the cases have similarities."

"Such as?"

"Well apart from age and general build... the four, all had similar small cuts on the back of their hands and palms."

"The first reports don't mention them?"

Stephanie rubbed her palms together "Yes I know, but I was there during the first two autopsies. Michael Caplin our Cheif Medical Examiner did those, they weren't really pertinent to the cause of death..."

"And they all had cnidocytes in their mouths" she rushed on "only in their mouths, not on their arms or faces or other exposed skin."

"There are jellyfish in Sulffolk county waters, but the cnidocytes weren't identified as being from either the Lions mane or Moon jellyfish... which doesn't mean anything really, all the bodies were in the water for a significant amount of time, degradation would occur. Besides... We just don't have the kind of jellyfish round here that would cause someone to react to so badly it would cause them to drown, a few stings like that, even in the mouth would hurt but you'd just get out of the water." She shook her head.

"I noticed you were still awaiting lab results, can you tell me about that?"

Stephanie flushed "Uhm well, all the usual lab results showed absolutely nothing." She faltered "So I did a tick all the boxes type request on the samples we had from Mr Sessa and Mr Larsen. To say that's frowned upon is putting it mildly" she admitted "but we have... quite a few Examiners staff away, including Mr Caplin, and I ..." she faded out looking guilty.

"Stephanie from my experience ticking all the boxes can be a very good thing, I would be, very, uh ...grateful, if you could send me a copy of those results, or if anything else comes to mind" he assured her handing her a card with their contact details.

Her smile held relief as they shook hands and said goodbye.

...

When Sam finally exited the Suffolk county medical examiner's office Dean was leaning against the impala, head tilted back, eyes closed, soaking up the sun, enjoying the baking heat radiating off Baby's gleaming paintwork and chrome.

Green eyes opened at the sound of his brother's footsteps nearing. Sam had gotten something out of the lady, he could tell by the way he walked, but the frown on his face said Sammy was still trying to work out what it meant.

"Montauk?"

"Yeah" Sam slid into the impala without another word.

It was an hour and a half drive to Montauk and neither spoke. Sam didn't rifle through the fistful of autopsy reports, he didn't do web searches or consult scanned copies of the men of letters files. He sat, brow creased and lips quirking. There were thoughts going on behind his brother's floppy hair and hazel eyes.

Dean waited for Sam to speak sitting calmly on the tipping point between acceptance and frustration.

Finally half an hour later Sam cleared his throat and sought his brothers eyes. "I think" he began "there is some kind of case here, but I don't know what we are looking at."

And so, he told his big brother everything the lady coroner had said.

...

Dean drove and digested for a while "Ever wonder why we don't get more beach cases?" He asked finally.

Sam shrugged.

"When we first started this gig after Stanford and um Jess" Dean checked his brothers face, there was a small twisted smile but not a complete shut down so he continued "things weren't good with you, sunshine and sand I guess there were too many memories"

"Jess was a Cali' girl, sun in her hair.. she just loved the beach." Sam's voice was wistful.

"Yeah, I followed you guys once..."

Sam looked up at that and Dean shrugged apologetically "You were just goofing round being normal kids at the beach" he smiled sadly "so after...I got that the beach wasn't going to be good for you. So, I sort of decided, to not to, unless I could help it."

Sam raised an eyebrow at that.

"There are other hunters Sam. But after a while I noticed that seaside cases were just naturally thin on the ground. I even asked a few other hunters about it. Bobby reckoned it was the salt water, a lot of fuglies have an issue with salt. The whole 'moving water thing too I guess. Whatever the reason though beach vacations aren't usually their scene."

"So, you don't think this is a case then?!" Sam's question was quiet.

"Nah I do, just expect the unexpected man, we work the case and hope that something washes up" he shot his brother a pouting smirk "Saving people an' hunting things Sammy! If it makes you feel better, next time do the lawyer thing and put a rider in excluding giant mutant French kissing jellyfish."

"If that's really a thing I'm sending Chuck some hate mail" Sam said ruefully raking his fingers through his hair and starting the research ritual.

...

The rest of the drive was more normal, Sam researching and imparting useless morsels of information about jellyfish to his brother. Dean listened with half an ear doing the nod and smile routine he often used in the face of Sam's shared research orgy.

Dean was considering more important things than the fact that jellyfish don't have brains or the fact that some people eat the things.

Dean was considering payback for the peroxide in the shampoo incident, it was a topic that required careful considered thought and planning.

The punishment must fit the crime, John Winchester had taught him that.

It had to be funny, because Dean prided himself on his humour.

It needed to take Sammy down a peg but not totally humiliate him, because his brother could be an angsty emo bitch at times.

And it couldn't interfere with the case, another rule John Winchester had drummed into both his sons. The case comes first, the other stuff works around or gets shelved.

He considered application of itching powder, he considered coffee laced with something to cause a bit of gastric distress, he considered adding Icyhot or cayenne pepper to Sam's shower stuff. But considering even low grade torture of his little brother left him cold, after seeing and hearing what the bitch of letters had done to done to his little brother.

Then, he struck on the perfect idea, now all he had to do was plan and execute. Then sit back and laugh.

 **A/N Yeah, I know I'm a tease but with a multi chapter fanfic it appears its allowable, it's called delayed gratification. :Kathy (please quit being a guest and sign up already girl! If I can manage it (all by myself without techno hubby) so can you) Yes it is a case, I had the monster of the week picke ago (and it probably isn't a giant french kissing jellyfish.) Just like the real world be patient and wait for the lab results. Because before I became that multi splendored creature known as a 'stay at home mum' (read hostage negotiator, autism specialist, animal tamer, expert on particle physics, theology and cake decoration …..) I was a lab tech.**


	8. Chapter 8

**Chapter 8**

Always deal with the underlings if you can.  
It was one of the things John Winchester had taught his sons.  
An underling has less to prove, less turf to defend and is usually slightly flattered you are talking to them. If you are pretending to be a FBI agent, they will be more intimidated and less likely to look too hard at your badge. It's always a good idea to turn up at break times or close to the end of shift, because those higher up the chain will dump you on an underling if they can.  
Sam and Dean knew all the tricks.

Sam stood back and watched his older brother work his charm on the lady behind the desk.

She was one of those thirty something New York women, closer to something than thirty. Sam could tell she wanted to convince herself she was still young enough to compete with the worlds sweet young things, but had come to the sad conclusion that she could not. She was fighting the losing battle bravely though, trying to make up for the extra mileage with enthusiasm, a can-do attitude and all the cosmetics money could buy. It was really, sort of, unfair to unleash Dean on her Sam thought, a bit like shooting fish in a barrel.

The woman handed Dean a stack of files which he shoved in Sam's direction while saying something that made her blush and laugh. She waved over a mid-twenty's kid wearing a t-shirt with a picture of a firefighter running with a comically dripping hose and the red and white legend "***Montauk Fire Dept***." Dean flashed his badge again and Sam followed suit not really paying attention. For a while there was an animated discussion between the three, then much nodding and smiling. Dean shook the kids hand, handed over his contact details to the woman and with a jaunty smile and wave they were out the door.

Dean favoured his brother with a frown "You okay? You sort of, just phoned it in, in there."

"Yeah, just, tired I guess"

"Well not much more we can do today, how 'bout I drop you back at the room for some shut eye, I can come back for that other report later."

"Other report?"

"The dismemberment, that one washed up on Plum island. Loraine's getting them to send the report over for us."

"Loraine hu?"

"She said it would be ready for the end of her shift, I was hopin' t' get a heads up on the bars 'n' things from her.

"From her or with her Dean?" He shot his brother a pained scowl.

"Judgey much bro, there's nothing wrong with a few drinks with a lovely lady."

"It never ends up just a couple of drinks, Dean."

"Consenting adults, Sammy, beautiful natural acts, even Chuck would approve."

"Yeah but would Amara?" He asked sourly with a huff.

Dean opened his mouth to speak then Sam watched him shut it again with a thoughtful look.

"Dean, it's just, a small town and she's a cop ya know..."

"I'd never do anything to mess up a case Sam."

"Fine!" Sam flared making his brother snort in amusement.

"You're such a girl Samantha you even got the passive aggressive 'fine' down pat. You get so bitchy when you're tired and hungry. Let's get you fed and then I can tuck you in with some bedtime reading before I sound out the locals."

...

Sam filled a glass of water from the tap and placed it and a bottle of Advil where his brother could reach it when he woke.

Dean had stumbled in at some point during the night, yodelling something cheerfully and inconsiderately loud about Sloppy Tunas and beer, then he'd kicked off his boots and slumped into bed fully dressed.

He would need intravenous coffee, a handful of pills and some kind of coronary inducing fast food, then he'd be good to go. Sam tried not to resent the inequality of it all. Ever since he could remember his older brothers recuperative powers had out stripped his own, something that felt incredibly unfair considering Dean was four years older.

…

When Scott, the volunteer from Montauk fire department, turned up in the all-terrain vehicle 90 minutes later Dean was bright eyed and enthusiastic. Sam ran a jaundiced eye over the small vehicle realising with a rising sense of dread that the cab would only fit two.

"Glad to see you two are dressed comfortably" Scott said easily taking in their worn jeans, flannel shirts and hard worn boots.

"Gotta look the part when you first turn up, if you're a duck you have to walk and quack like a duck. Workin' and quackin' though, they very rarely get the job done. " Dean shrugged eyeing the little Polaris enthusiastically "Awesome, now I see why you dudes volunteer."

"Definitely one of the perks, though we make up for it when the water rescue work involves bringing in bodies" the kid swallowed and looked away.

"It's hard sometimes, but volunteers like you do good work" Sam acknowledged with a solemn look.

The kid shrugged "I surfed with Shaun and Tim. Marty Mc Millians kid, Cody, was a couple of years behind me at high school... Montauk is a pretty small place off season."

"Anything extra you can tell us about the victims or town would really help." Dean nodded in agreement with his brother.

"So, who's riding on the back first?" Scott gestured at the small flatbed of the little Polaris. To Scott's amusement, a quick game of paper scissors rock ensued between the two FBI agents before the taller of the two took a seat in the cab.

"We could go back for one of the four wheel drives" Scott offered looking out the back at the other agent.

"Nah, Deans fine" Sam assured him "he's a bit like a dog really, if he can't be driver he'd rather have his head out the window anyway." The two in the front shared a look at the sounds of enthusiasm coming from the back as they drove.

"Sounds like you know him pretty well."

"That's part of the life I guess" Sam shrugged "So, small town, what can you tell me about the victims?"

"They were all good men, the best. All of them spent years round the sea. It's hard to believe that they drowned. But I guess they did. "

"I know-knew Shaun best, he dated my dad's kid sister, she's like... my cool Aunty, since she's only 10 years older than me, we hung out lots. Shaun, he got me into surfing...that's all before he met Lisa of course, they've been married coming on 6 years." The kid sighed and rubbed his eyes. "He proposed to Lisa on top of the lighthouse..." the kid muttered "His body washed up about four miles from there." The young man gave a helpless shrug. "I guess in your job things like this are small fry, you're probably used to it."

"No, not really" Sam's forehead scrunched "you never really get used to good people dying, sometimes there's a reason, we can make things better sometimes, for people down the line. But , uh, it's never really enough." The agent's hazel and grey eyes stared into space pensively.

"So why are the FBI interested in drownings, I mean if I can ask of course."

"Sometimes our job's about dotting the i's and crossing the t's." The agent replied.

….

They pulled off 27, Montauk highway and pulled into Montauk point State park, the green sign that guarded the way declared it to be "The surf casting Capital of the world."

"We'll follow this route nearly all the way to the lighthouse, then swing along the coast to where the bodies washed up" Scott advised him.

There was a whoop of joy from the Polaris's bed again, "Your partner seems to be having fun back there."

Sam pulled a face "Dean only pretends to be an adult when he has to, that said, he's probably better at this job than I'll ever be. So, the lighthouse, what can you tell me, any interesting legends?"

"Montauk point light was the first lighthouse in the New York State, it's the fourth oldest active lighthouse in USA." Scott recited as if repeating a lesson, which possibly he was. "There's a lot of history there but it's never really been my thing, The Franzones, Doris and her husband Lawrence run the historical society they're the ones to talk to. I can hook you up, but don't expect me to wait around for the history torture."

Sam chucked good naturedly at the distaste in the kids voice.

"Yeah, nah, history torture, I'll save that for Dean, Agent Cassidy. What about the less historical stuff."

"Well we have a lot of legends, rumours and conspiracy theories around here, agent, everything from aliens to time travel and then there's the Plum Island Animal Disease Centre, some people think they are making monsters out there. We locals don't give it any more credence than Lenny Nicole's drunken stories about how he saw a mermaid or Mikey Arcara's claims that he doesn't set town mailboxes on fire for kicks. Hell! there are people that say the weird storms we've been having are the judgement of God due to all 'the drunken fornicating hipsters' we get every summer."

...

"Anything?"

"Nada!"

"Not even a jellyfish" Sam muttered shaking his head.

"You're just disappointed there weren't any freaky monster corpses."

Sam and Dean stood side by side on the windswept beach looking out to sea in silence for a while.

"Well, maybe hoping for hex bags or enochian symbols carved in the rocks, or anything at all...was a bit much to hope for, how many times has the tide been in and out here since the last body washed up? Besides this is only where they washed up, Scott says they could have drowned miles from here. The currents funnel stuff to shore in certain places..."

"Yeah, I know." Dean scuffed his boot in the sand and looked up at his brother "man this case blows!" He bent down and picked up a clear light blue piece of glass from the sand, held it up to the sun.

"What's that?"

"Glass I guess" Dean muttered handing it over "maybe you can decorate your sandcastle with it" Sam sighed deeply then shoved it into his pocket absent mindedly.

"I admit, this whole thing's a bit too much like real police work" Sam swiped his sea blown hair out of his face in irritation "I guess next we interview the families."

Dean made a face "Great, well you get to ride in the back on the way home." He gestured towards Scott who sat waiting in the Polaris.

"What? I thought you were having the time of your life back there."

"Oh, I was, but you need to live a little Sammy, let the wind blow through your hair, Rapunzel. Up your protein intake by eatin' a few bugs, that sort of thing."

"Jerk."

"Here catch" his brother tossed him a bottle of sunscreen "Don't say I do nothing for you, can't have you gettin' all sun burnt Princess Snow White."

"Uh, thanks" Sam hummed in surprise.

"You've been spending too much time in your ivory tower Bro. Besides, it's my job to take care of you Sammy" Dean muttered indulgently watching his brother apply the sunscreen.

Sam didn't see his brothers evil grin as he turned and climbed in the cab.

…..

"So, find anything helpful?" Scott inquired.

"We ticked the boxes" Dean shrugged noncommittally."

"So back to base?"

"Yeah, thanks kid. Take your time, got something happening that, needs time to develop" Dean chuckled to himself.

"Hu?"

"A bit of payback on Agent Bonaduce, we got a competition goin' on" Dean smirked.

...

"Hey Scott thanks" Sam leaned into the Polaris.

Scott's eyes widened in shock and he looked sideways at Dean, Dean grinned back at him like a kid at the fair and hopped out.

"Uh, I'll text you Doris' number" Scott said eyeing Sam strangely and waved the card with their contact details, before driving off quickly.

"He looked like he saw a ghost." Sam offered puzzled.

"No, definitely not a ghost Sam, gotta go get somethin' from the car, then we can clean up, eat and make with the interviewing."

"There're dead bugs in my hair aren't there?"

...

Sam stood in front of the mirror, his mouth open in shock.

No, not a ghost ... he was definitely... he was definitely WAYyyy too, orange to be a ghost. His mind back tracked over recent events as the penny dropped.

"DEANnnnn!" He bellowed, the muscles along his jaw jumping in fury.

"I take it terracotta, isn't you" Dean rumbled in amusement from the doorway.

Sam lunged across the room and grabbed the front of his brothers shirt.

"It Is Not Funny" he grated in fury then pushed his brother away from him in disgust.

"Wellll it sort of is, Sammy" eyebrows raised he lifted his hands in surrender "Easy, easy! Here" he tossed his brother a lemon and a canister of salt.

"What the?"

"Like in the movie "The wedding planner," mix then scrub, scrub. You are su-ch a melodramatic bitch, it's on-ly a little fashion disaster, not the end of the world" Dean said mildly then proceeded to take out his phone and snap a few photos for good measure.

Sam looked down at the salt and lemon feeling completely flummoxed and deflated.

"You're calling ME a bitch while giving me fashion advice based on a bad RomCom?" Sam huffed "Dude I'm sooo gonna tell Jodie on you!" He declared slamming the bathroom door to get the last word.

 **A/N So Sam, the balls back in your co** **urt, are you going to admit defeat or up the anti?**

 **Ideas guys! Thanks to SpnK15 for your help deciding how to torture Sam in this chapter. To all of you silent lurkers (I don't know who you are, but, according to the stats I stumbled across while trying to post this chapter there are more of you than I'd dare hope) toss me a comment, even if it's just to complain about my excessive use of commas. It gives me the encouragement to prioritise writing this and since 'The School Holidays Of Doom' are upon us prioritisation is the only way 'Time Can Be Made.'**


	9. Chapter 9

**Chapter 9**

When Sam emerged out of the bathroom pink with scrubbing, looking more tanned than usual but no longer an alarming shade of orange; Dean found himself musing that maybe he ought to avoid any more decoration of his brothers face for a while in case all the scrubbing wore his face off.

Dean was ready, to offer up a sacrifice of pleasing vegetation unto the bronzed deity, to appease his woeful wrath. Which translated as he had bought his brother crappy vegetarian hippy food from a disturbing place with the name "Naturally Good foods and Cafe," in Deans book a cafe that had to tell you that it was 'good', probably wasn't.

The bronzed deity examined the offering critically.

The bronzed deity partook of the vegetation and the penitent waited to see if the offering would be accepted and remission of sins granted.

Sam made a small humph sound of acceptance and Dean relaxed in the knowledge that Sam wasn't going to pout all day and generally be a whiny bitch.

"This is actually good" Sam looked surprised and eyed his brother's food choice from the same premises in interest. "What's that?"

"This" Dean said with a raised eyebrow "is the only thing on the menu that has any form of dead animal protein. This is" Dean paused for effect "The Montauk Monster! Yellowfin tuna, salad, avocado, cheddar cheese, tomato, red onion and sprouts on sprouted wheat bread" with every mention of an ingredient from the vegetable kingdom Dean gave a theatrical shudder of distaste. "What the hell even is sprouted wheat bread for Petes sake!"

Sam rolled his eyes "So consuming salad items is your penance?"

"Yup" Dean replied, around an overstuffed mouthful. "So... interviewing next of kin, we got four. Since the first one, slice n dice on Plum Island hasn't been IDed. Wanna split em and cover more ground?"

"Sure, sooo..." Sam considered his notes "I'll take Marty Mc Millians ex Susan and the son Cody. An' I'll take L... I mean Mrs Sessa" Sam avoided the name Lisa darting a look at his brother. "That leaves you Garard Larsens housemate Randall Arc and Tim Tierneys girlfriend Penny Forbes."

"Ok, jack it up. I will go make myself awesomely good looking for the viewing public."

...

Sam was glad he hadn't sent Dean to interview Lisa Sessa.

There was the name of course, Lisa. It had been 7 years since Dean had walked away from Lisa and Ben, 7 years since he'd had Cas wipe their minds. But the year Dean had had with Lisa and Ben was the closest he'd ever had to a normal life. Lisa was, the could have been. And the painful truth that, by virtue of being a Winchester normal was never going to be theirs. If you loved them you got the hell away from them, before they paid in blood. Or burned. Sam took a shallow breath around unbidden thoughts of Jess, which led him back to the fact that for all these years since Jessica's death Dean had avoided the beach to spare him.

So, Sam was glad Dean wasn't here, because Lisa Sessa was a Lisa. But also because this Lisa was an upset grieving widow and Dean would have been out of his depth... but also because Lisa Sessa had a cat.

That cat was a very, very friendly cat. And that cat was moulting furiously in preparation for summer. Dean was allergic to cats, Sam didn't want his brother to suffer... well maybe a little, after the fake tan prank...

Mrs Sessa answered all his questions and she was as helpful as she could be, but all she really knew was that her husband had gone for his usual evening jog along the coast. When it had gotten late she'd begun to worry and driven his usual running route in the car looking for him, finding nothing she'd begun to panic. After looking everywhere, he could possibly be, she'd contacted the police.

The police had searched.

A day later his body had washed up less than four miles from the place he'd proposed to her.

There was no explanation why he'd even been in the sea.

Lisa Sessa had lost the love of her life and her world had imploded; but, she was trying to be brave, she was grateful to everyone who had been so kind to her in her grief, including Sam.

Wearily Sam wondered if knowing that her husband hadn't just drowned accidentally but might have been killed by something would make things better or worse.

When she apologised and offered him a lint brush to clean off the cat hair he smiled in thanks. Love and suffering, they were linked he thought sadly and tried to set his mind to work on the next prank for his big brother. Whom he loved, and would make suffer.

Strangely enough his visit with Lisa Sessa had given him an idea, one so cunning you could pin a tail on it and call it, ... well a cat, really. He just needed a way to distract his big brother for a bit.

...

Sam sat opposite Susan Mc Millian with the obligatory cup of coffee in front of him studying the woman critically as she told him about her ex-husbands death. There was grief there, but there was also something else, it had to do with her and Mc Millians son Cody, if he wasn't mistaken.

Marty Mc Millian was a commercial tuna fisherman, a good one from a family that had been tuna fisherman back two generations. The story that an anchor rope had tangled around his leg dragging him overboard, then his body had been swept away by a rip was plausible. And yet... Susan hadn't actually been there, Cody the 17 year old son had.

Cody had sat quietly by his mother's side looking slightly pained and uncomfortable through most of the story and then when he'd opened his mouth to speak his mother had sent him away. Using the excuse the whole thing was upsetting the boy.

"Uh I don't suppose I could have a glass of water and use the bathroom before I head off, could I?" He asked politely giving her a dimpled little boy smile.

"Yes, sure. Up the stairs, second door on the left, the first ones Cody's." She said going off to fetch his glass of water.

Sam climbed the stairs and knocked on Cody's door.

"Hi, can I come in?"

"Uh, yeah" the kid turned reddened eyes towards Sam and wiped his nose on the back of his sleeve.

"Cody, it seemed to me you wanted to tell me something down there" Sam hunched in the desk chair across the room from where the kid perched on the bed trying to look non-threatening and friendly.

The kid swallowed nervously.

Sam waited, face open and earnest.

"No one believes me..."

"Try me, I'm not here to judge - just listen. Because even if you didn't see what you thought you saw... what you thought you saw could be important."

"It wasn't an anchor rope, it was Something. Something grabbed his leg and dragged him overboard."

"I saw, I thought I saw an arm come up and grab him. There was something in the water, not a shark or a fish or anything that makes sense ... Something with arms and hands... but Mom says that's nuts!"

"Cody you've been through a lot" Sam soothed "minds in times of stress fill in the gaps, that doesn't make you nuts it just means you loved your Dad and you want answers. Sometimes our mind latches on to perceived details to avoid dealing with the grief we feel" Sam said gently and smiled winningly at the boy.

The boy slumped, won over by the voice of authority before him.

"Yeah I guess. Uh, thanks. Thanks for not laughing or saying I'm nuts" he offered Sam a watery smile, plunging a stab of guilt into Sam's heart.

"You've got to hold on to the good stuff, ya know. It gets better, honestly." He patted the kid gently on the shoulder and descended the stairs to say goodbye to the boy's mother.

Something in the water.

Sam shivered and fingered the piece of blue glass and the carefully wrapped ball of cat hair in his pocket.

Just once he would have liked to just build a sandcastle and think up new ways to get revenge on his brother.

But that wasn't how Winchester luck worked.

 **A/N Meh! I'm sick, well actually I've been sick for weeks. Darling daughter number one brought it home from college (which is high school over here in NZ) after incubating it into weapons grade strain (I could sell the kid to ISIS as a culture and dispersal medium of mass destruction) she gave it to her doting Mummy because Christmas is a season of giving isn't it?! The coughing and hacking up of glop is one thing but for the past 3 days the blasted things made its way into my ears …. It's like having a fishbowl full of water on my head. Every sound is magnified and muffled simultaneously, it all echoes round in here. So please send me reviews to cheer me up. *Mournful begging puppy dog eyes***


	10. Chapter 10

**Chapter 10**

"Dean you have to be joking" Sam heard his voice get progressively louder and more high pitched with every word.

"It's belongs to f cking Department of Homeland Security, why don't you just suggest we abduct the President instead, hu? It'd probably be easier."

Dean didn't argue he just gave Sam 'The Look' it was closely related to John Winchesters Look, which said "You will do what you're told, boy. Or else!" That look, it had always been like blood in the water to a shark, for Sam.

He opened his mouth to continue ranting and closed it again. Because Dean was Dean, not Dad.

"De-an!" He found himself whining just like he had when he was a kid.

"Sammy, tell me what else we can do. People are dyin'. You said it yourself the kids 'Something in the water, with arms and hands' is either man made or it's supernatural, an' if it's man made, it's probably come from that Plum Island lab."

Sam huffed out a breath of frustration and pinched the bridge of his nose "It's the Department of freaking Homeland Security, I'm not arguing because I'm worried I'll break a nail.

I just don't think we can get in. In 2013 they let some journalists take a tour after they developed the foot and mouth vaccine but that was after YEARS of asking for permission. You can bet they weren't allowed to wander round looking for sea monsters.

Dean, you know how we get into places, we find an organisation above them on the food chain and wave a stick menacingly at them, we get in and out quick; before they realise they've been had. You tell me what's above the Department of Homeland Security Dean... how do we fake that?"

"Sam they're a bunch of geeks on an island playin' with test tubes, guarded by some grunts with guns. You can find us a way in." Dean wheedled.

"This is different Dean."

"No, it's not. You got this."

How many times had Dean said those words to him over the years, Sam wondered. 'You got this.' Green eyes somehow hypnotising him with the depth of their belief.

It was horribly unfair.

Sam closed his eyes taking a deep breath, trying to think.

Research. Not on lore this time, on government departments.

Tugging his fingers through his hair he looked up resentfully at his brother, who was beginning the process of stripping and cleaning their weapons in contemplative silence. The smell of gun oil and the small sounds of metal components disassembling was oddly soothing.

Flipping open the laptop Sam immersed himself in the data trying to live up to his brother's belief.

...

Deans hands were busy with the almost graceful dance of caring for the weapons.

His mind was in turmoil, he wasn't an idiot, messing with the department of homeland security wasn't a game. Monsters, Leviathan, Heaven, Hell, Gods sister, none of that had put the blind look of panic on his brothers face, or the sickening twist in his own guts the way the thought of poking at homeland security did. Sam would find a way in, he was sure.

But should they take it? Time was ticking and another body would drop soon. Someone's husband, someone's boyfriend, someone's son... or brother.

He remembered Penny Forbes tear streaked face, the grief she felt, having lost the guy she loved to the thing in the water.

He remembered every time he'd looked down at Sam, dead, using the memories of that howling, soul eating grief and pain, which still shadowed those memories like a penitent's lash. He thought about what he'd done in Hell, the souls he'd ripped apart, the mistakes he'd made and knew deep down he couldn't walk away.

He'd pay and pay and pay and still he'd never tip the scales towards paying what he owed. And Sam, he couldn't keep him out of it. If he could, Dean would pay for Sam too. But Sam was through letting Dean fight his battles.

"Take care of your brother" Dad had always said.

But Dean knew it had started before that, before the fire and Moms death. Mom had told him the story every night while Sammy grew inside her, "The story of Sam." The story that even Dad didn't know or if he did, he'd forgotten. It went with how Mom had always told him angels were watching over him, the other half of the story. Dean had wanted a little brother, with everything in his 3-year-old heart, he'd begged and pleaded for a little brother but Mom and Dad weren't convinced. Mary had been so sick with Dean, it wasn't a good idea.

"So, Dean prayed to God, with tears streaming down his little cheeks, Dean prayed." Mary had told him every night after cuddles and kisses, with an indulging smile, she'd laid his small hand over the bump in her tummy. "And God listened, and gave you a little brother."

Before Sam was born, before the fire and Moms death, before Dad had lost part of himself to vengeance, before angels and vessels, before everything. Sam had been Deans responsibility. Because he'd prayed for him.

And now Dean had met God, and his sister. Chuck had called him and Sam the firewall between Dark and Light - That was his responsibility too.

The conflict between those two responsibilities tore at him constantly.

Dean found himself wondering why he'd never told Sam, "The story of Sam." He wondered if Mom now would one day -

...

"Hu, apparently, the department of homeland security ranks as the worst federal agency for happy employees" Sam muttered from across the room looking up.

"Not much job satisfaction in sitting on an island cooking up monsters, ya think?"

Sam shot his brother an irritable look "There's not much sitting in a motel room trying to work out how to kill them either, if you ask me."

"I don't know, I really enjoyed ganking Hitler..." Dean got a bitchy look and a reluctant smile for his trouble.

"Maybe you're on to something with the geeks and grunts thing" Sam mused.

"Yeah?"

A look of 'Sammy working things out' had settled on the younger Winchesters face.

"Yeah, so we've got job dis-satisfaction, distrust of management and add a little bit of fear of being accused of wasting taxpayer money.

What if you were good Ol' Joseph O'Keef and you got an internal email from Jeh Johnson Secretary of Homeland Security himself, informing him 'Allegations have been made' and 'Investigation will be made ASAP, before any of this gets out and affects your instillations funding, or heads will roll, starting with yours.'"

"Well, if I was good Ol' Joseph O'Keef I'd probably crap myself, then get my butt down to the dock to pick up Agents... who are we this week?" Dean chuckled "So, you can do that?"

"Sure." The dimpled smile flashed. "Just gotta set up a fake email for Jeh Johnson that looks legit but that routes back to a hidden one behind..." And he was off!

...

Dean looked down at his brother's handiwork in frank admiration "College boy, you're a genius ya deserve a beer."

"Oh, I know" Sam answered mildly thinking of a certain ball of cat hair sitting quietly behind the grill of the impala's driver's side air vent.

...

Dean sneezed and rubbed his eyes. Sam studied his brother with fained concern "You ok?"

"Yeah, aaahchooo, I'm fine ah ah chooo."

"You don't look fine." Sam said eyeing his brother critically. "You sure you aren't coming down with something."

"S-m I'm fin- ah ah Choo!"

Sam rolled his eyes studying his red eyed sneezing brother skeptically.

Idly he wondered how long Dean would suffer before being willing to take the anti-histamine he'd bought. And how long before Dean decided he was dying, because Dean only had two settings 'Fine' and 'Sammy I think I'm gonna die.' 'Sammy I think I'm gonna die' usually had no relation to actual proximity to death. Real dying, Dean did stoically. "Sammy I'm gonna die" only happened with minor ailments... like cat allergy.

By the end of the drive to the bar of Deans choice, Dean was in full allergic meltdown, nose running, eyes watering sneezing, the whole nine yards. But he was adamant that they were going in. Whiskey would cure all. Sam followed his brother into the Sloppy Tuna and glanced around. The place was, well, it wasn't a dive. Better yet, it offered food that looked edible and had an open deck looking out over the ocean. There was even a small notice advertising that tonight there'd be live music. Away from the impala and its hidden ball of cat hair Deans miserable symptoms abated he became mellow and relaxed and Sam felt the tensions of the day slide away. When the girl began to sing from the small stage area Sam didn't even look at her, until Dean made a comment. When he did, for a second it was like the world stopped. It was like seeing a ghost, except Jess had never got to be this age, she would forever be 21. But the blonde wavy hair, the smile, the way she tilted her head. Sam stared at the woman on stage singing and playing the guitar reminding himself over and over that she wasn't Jessica Moore, she was a stranger.

Dean nudged Sam impatiently "Hu?"

"Earth to Sammy."

"Yeah I'm here" his eyes kept sliding back to the girl on stage Dean followed his gaze and raised his eyebrow.

"So we gonna eat or what?"

"Hu?"

"Tell ya what, I'll just order for you shall I?" Dean chuckled, amused.

"Yeah, sure..."

...

Dean was both amused and irritated, Sam had spent the entire time the chick had been singing, staring at her like a moony puppy. He'd eaten his burger on autopilot not even noticing that it wasn't some weird vege platter and contained actual red meat. Sammy sure had a type, that was for sure. It hadn't escaped his notice that the girl looked more than a little like Jess, it hadn't escaped his notice that his brother had asked about her at the bar and checked when she'd sing next. Seemed Sammy was thinking of taking up a different kind of hunt in Montauk. His big brother was proud but he really hoped Sam wasn't like the guy at the pound that adopted a dog because it looked just like the one he had as a kid; and found that Rover mark 2 chewed his shoes, dug up the lawn and crapped on the door mat. Dean sneezed again and wiped his red watering eyes as he drove back to the motel, and here he thought the blasted cold had been kicked to the curb, now here he was sneezing and sniffling again.

...

Dean burst back into the room, with coffee and breakfast in one hand and a look of horror on his face.

"Sam!" he all but yodelled in distress "Sam! We gotta check Baby!... I think, I think there's a curse on her!" His eyes were wide in horror as he dragged his hand through his blonded hair in distress.

Sam stared at his brother in shock "A curse on the impala...?"

"Yeah, every time I drive her I end up like this" he waved his hand at his allergy reddened eyes and nose. "Some Evil skevie witch has done this, crap Sam what are we dealing with in this town!"

Sam couldn't hold it in any longer, he doubled over laughing.

"Sam, Sam" Dean cried in distress rushing to his brothers side "where does it hurt, I'll check for hexbags" his brother began trashing the room in a frantic search.

Sam straightened and with difficulty pulled himself together "DEAN! STOP! I'm fine, you're fine, the frickin' cars fine. DEAN STOP!" He bellowed to get through to his frantic brother.

Dean stopped.

"Come on I'll show you." Sam couldn't help laughing as his brother followed him reluctantly out to the impala.

"Here's your hex bag" he said prying off the vent and fishing out the ball of cat hair.

"What...?" Dean whatted still not catching up.

"Cat hair Dean... just a prank" his brothers mouth dropped open.

"So... you evil son of a b tch!" he breathed shaking his head "you sneaky evil ..."

"Cat hair, Dean Winchesters kryptonite" Sam said shooting his brother a grin that was all dimples and sunshine.

 **A/N So, gosh! I hope you liked this chapter. I really wanted to make you laugh. Thanks for all your reviews my heads still in the fishbowl but I'm on the mend (I pray.) And your reviews push me to write faster.**

' **The story of Sam' thing isn't cannon, it's based on how the Bumblebee activist got a little brother. Teaching green eyed little boys to pray is a dangerous thing, I paid for it with 9 months of miserable puking. Personally, I think Mr 2-year-old is quite capable of starting an apocalypse, too. But I've never seen a kid love his little brother more. Maybe that's why I like Supernatural so much….**


	11. Chapter 11

**Chapter 11**

The ferry horn pierced the thick morning fog between Orient Point at the North Fork's tip and Plum Island, jet black great cormorants watched the ferry pass from their perches atop the wooden piling as the ferry cut through the water and entered Plum Gut Harbour. Sam and Dean stood side by side at the ferry's railing breathing the sea air and swallowing down a trepidation that had more to do with science and bureaucracy than anything else.

Sam had researched and done what he could to prepare them both. Dean had listened grimly like a student cramming for a test for which failure was not an option.

They both knew it wasn't enough.

Stanford Pre-law wasn't enough and a GED and a can-do attitude, sure as hell wasn't. Bullying and false bluster might be though, they were there to ask the questions not the other way around.

...

Joseph O'Keef was a tall prematurely grey man with blue eyes that swum behind fashionably framed glasses, he had a pompous dementor and a perfectly pressed suit, his Oklahoma accent and impeccably shined shoes set Deans teeth on edge, but nothing about the man spoke of mad scientist - The man was a bureaucrat an uncomfortable, slightly flustered one, at that.

As they passed through the barbed wire fences and were searched by Department of Homeland Security agents it was clear that the way had definitively been paved for them.

The agents stationed on Plum Island were not the cream of the crop, there were little signs, but they were obvious, their discipline was lax, their checks cursory. They looked at Sam and Dean like they were sharks in a goldfish pond and no one wanted to tangle with them. The brothers exchanged relieved glances as they were ushered into the lab grounds themselves.

…

Behind the large white framed blue and red sign emblazoned with the homeland Security crest and the words "Plum Island Animal Disease Centre," sat the laboratory itself. Surrounded by a vast expanse of stunted sea grass it seemed to hunch in wait. Built first in 1911 and remodeled in 1954 the buildings frontage was dusty rose and white stone with white framed windows, the peaked section at the front framing and curving away from a large entrance guarded by stout stone pillars. Behind that the rest of the rambling structure was made up of clunky white rectangular buildings that looked very much added on as an afterthought.

...

The bureaucracy was beginning to drive Dean insane he shot his brother a pained look as 'the induction process' continued. Documents requiring reading and signing, affidavits promising "avoidance of contact with cattle, sheep, goats, deer and... swine for 5 days." Crash courses in emergency procedures and standard laboratory protocols.

Once Sam had made it clear that "they would be requiring access to all levels of the facility as they saw fit" a small flap ensued and a grave looking scientist in a white coat drew a vial of blood from each of them for a base line serum sample...more paperwork...

Dean tried not to fidget and let Sam take point, thinking that if the whole process had any more red-tape, it would strangle him. He supposed that the mad scientists at PIADC were being careful to follow every procedure by the book and make a good showing, he knew that it was a sign that they were being taken at face value. That they were feared not suspected.

He was also beginning to suspect the mad scientists weren't mad, they were just geeky smart, slightly worried by the scrutiny and frigging boring. Dean eyed his little brother wondering if Sam was enjoying the geek fest or if he was also longing to run screaming. What the heck had they gotten themselves into?

….

Joseph O'Keef left them alone in his office while he went to fetch "one of the lab staff to do the tour and someone to give them computer access, and show them all the documentation."

Shaking his head in bemusement Sam discovered the man hadn't even locked his computer before leaving, taking the chance he quickly copied all his personal files and emails for examination later; while Dean riffled through the man's desk, finding nothing more incriminating than a hip flask and a few photos of Mr O'Keef at last year's Christmas party, wearing what appeared to be a tutu and fairy wings while assisting Santa giving out presents to a bunch of kids.

"Dean put that back!" Sam hissed as Dean screwed the lid back on the flask.

"Sam, come on. It's practically medicinal. I'm replacing the fluid that lab leech took." He grumbled replacing everything, Sam shot him a look that clearly said his brother was both irresponsible, irritating and how they were ever related was one of life's mysteries.

...

When Joseph returned, he was accompanied by a stout middle aged guy wearing comfortable jeans and a casual shirt - and a kid.

Sam found himself wondering if it was 'bring your kid to work day,' the kid hung back behind the two men as if looking for protection and only stepped forward when she was introduced as "Sara Keene one of our senior virology technicians."

"Senior?" He found himself querying as his hand engulfed her tiny one and she looked up at him from behind a pair of glasses that looked way too big for her, big blue eyes and a face scattered with freckles. She seemed to cringe away from contact with him but lifted her chin with a look of defiance.

"Sara's 23 and has been with us for two years now... she is very good at her job agent Singer." Joseph O'Keef informed him in a cool Oklahoma tones "Granted she is the youngest tech here at PIADC, but seniority here has to do with ability and qualifications, not size or age." He continued and Sam got the feeling he'd just kicked the lab mascot.

Dean stepped forward into the awkward silence that followed "Don't mind agent Singer, one of our other co-workers calls him Moose. He means well, but, he went and ruined his brain with studying law at Stanford, before we got hold of him" Dean shot his brother a warning look.

The stout guy stepped forward "I'm Steve, Steve Weir. I'm PIADCs MSO which is a Microbiological Safety Officer. That means I'm the bloke that makes sure no one breaches containment or stubs their toe, I'm also keeper of the procedural paperwork and incident reports and I've got all the audit reports and accreditation details" He looked between the two agents expectantly "Which one of you is up for death by paperwork?" Dean stepped back quickly and grinned at the kid "That sounds right up Agent Singers alley, doesn't it? Where are we off to?"

The kid shot Joseph a complicated look that was part pleading for help, part grumpy kid that's been told to tidy her room AND entertain her annoying cousin at the same time. The stuffed suit simply turned and walked away.

"Well I have _Work_ to do in cell culture" she said emphasising the word work while eyeing Joseph O'Keef's retreating back

"So, I guess there, if that's not a problem?"

...

Dean sat uncomfortably attired in a lab coat, blue shoe coverings and a surgical mask, he was perched on a swivel chair with his back to a bench containing a complicated looking microscope. After explaining that the cell culture lab was a clean space and that they were wearing all the protective getup to protect the cell cultures from contamination, the kid had ordered him to sit and not touch anything. For once Dean was actually doing what he was told. The weird scientific stuff made him nervous.

Now the little despot was seated in front of a large metal box with a glass front that gave off the constant rumbling of air suction, she was gloved, double gowned and face masked with what appeared to be a tray of eggs, a selection of glass dishes, metallic instruments and bottles of funny coloured pink liquid in front of her in the 'Biohazard cabinet' .

"What are you doing" Dean queried. "That's if you can talk an' work"

She looked over her shoulder at him "Yeah I can do both, this stuff gets kind of automatic. The short answer is I'm making an embryo chicken liver cell culture" she snorted looking at Deans incomprehension "I can tell you what I'm doing step by step and why, maybe then, please, can you tell me why you're here. Joseph didn't really tell me anything and I don't see how I can help you without knowing what you're looking for." She squirted clear fluid over the egg shells.

"Viruses need living cells to reproduce, they hijack the cells and sort of set them to work making copies of themselves. Here in cell culture we make and grow cell lines. Right now, I'm harvesting the livers of these chicken embryos to produce a primary cell line" she fished a featherless chick out of the shell and laid it spread eagled on a glass Petri dish. "The chicks themselves are dead, but the cells are still viable" with a pair of small metal scissors she chopped open the chick fished around in its guts with some tweezers and pulled out a tiny pink lump. "We take our organ of choice" She held up the lump of glistening tissue "and digest it down into single cells and seed it into cell culture flasks, containing growth medium. They adhere to the plastic of the flask in a single layer. We then use the cell culture to grow virus either out of diagnostic samples or of known virus we are studying. I'll show you yesterday's lot once I've got these done."

Dean watched her work in horrified fascination, once she had degutted all the chicks and retrieved all the lumps she added them to a flask of pink fluid with a white rod in it that whizzed round and round on top of a small metal device with a dial on the front.

"So now it's your turn she said simply "how can I help?"

"We are here because there have been allegations that things are being made here that shouldn't be." Dean said carefully.

The kid started laughing then shook her head with a sigh of exasperation "Seriously? Which ruddy politician's read Michael blasted Carrolls book now? Every couple of years some idiot thinks they've found PIADCs deep dark secret and starts another Montauk monster hunt. I've worked here for 2 years, been over every inch of Plum Island. Worked with every scientist, we're like a family here, even the annoying ones like Woldeck." She shook her head "especially the annoying ones like Woldeck, he's sexist and racist and a pompous know it all, but everyone here works hard to protect America, from things that the public don't even know to be worried about. The media and politicians who are out to make a name for themselves, they scaremonger and accuse public servants like us of being evil mad scientists cooking up sinister plagues to start the next apocalypse." The kid sighed "I don't suppose there's any point in shooting the messenger though… I just wish they understood we are trying to protect everyone in America here"

A timer beeped and she poured the digested chicken livers through a filter covered funnel into a tube of liquid, capped it off then took it over to a balance by the opposite wall and made a tube of water to match.

"So now we spin this down in the centrifuge to sediment out the cells, count it and seed it into a culture flask. Later-on I'll inoculate yesterdays ones with some suspected avian influenza samples."

...

It had been a long day. Sam and Dean stood side by side on the return ferry feeling exhausted... and one of them felt...very clean.

After traipsing all over the facility, looking in every lab building in the complex, talking to every staff member and digging through a mountain of paperwork their last visit had been to the Biosafety level 3+ lab.

By that point it had become very clear that Plum Island Animal Disease Centre was not, nor ever had been, creating genetically modified sea monsters.

When it had been explained that, the only thing that went into the lab, that didn't come out via a giant autoclave, was naked people and those people would be thoroughly decontaminated a frantic game of paper scissors rock ensued.

Somehow, Sam lost.

It had been a slightly mortifying experience to strip naked and traipse through the air lock. Sam had been even more mortified that the lab scrubs available for visitors were on the snug side on his lanky frame. Following Steve round the lab and faking interest in all the science stuff had been… hard work. The stripping naked yet again and decontamination "showering out," then standing dripping waiting for the airlock to cycle a change of air, had done Sam's hair no wonders at all.

But the whole experience had removed the remnants of his unwanted fake tan rather nicely, Dean thought.

"Well what did you think of our trip to lab land" Dean drawled.

"If I never see another lab coat for as long as I live, it will be too soon" Sam muttered darkly.

"So, it's back to the drawing board?"

"Heck yes, I'm almost relieved" Sam exhaled ruffling his very clean hair "it's gotta be supernatural, which means we hit the lore."

Dean looked back towards the fast retreating Island "That kid back there thinks she's protecting America" he mused.

"I guess she is."

"Doesn't seem right to let a kid do the job of protecting us" Dean humphed

Sam chuckled and stared at his brother amused "How old were you, your first hunt, Dean? How old was I?"

"Yeah I know, but...the whole invisible deadly diseases thing... I've never thought about it before... and now I know… a kid's got the job..."

"It's no different" Sam shrugged "let her protect us from the stuff we don't know about and we'll protect her from the stuff she doesn't know about."

 **A/N Sorry for the trip to 'Labcoat land' folks you can take the girl out of the lab but you can't take the lab out of the girl. It was just across the water and I couldn't help visiting. Surely you gotta give me a few points for letting you watch Sam in the shower though… Seriously though folks decontamination showering is s-o not sexy it's just part of the job. Send reviews and maybe I'll stop torturing you with science and get back to hunting monsters.**


	12. Chapter 12

**Chapter 12**

Dean emerged from the bathroom as Sam sat typing a memo to Joseph O'Keef 'from Jeh Johnson' thanking him for accommodating the agents and being of exemplary help in laying to rest the obviously unfounded accusations.

Reading over his brother's shoulder Dean cleared his throat "Don't be too nice to the guy Sammy, remember Homeland Security staff are supposed to be miserable and underappreciated."

"I wanted to give them an atta boy," Sam shrugged ruefully.

"Yeah, you gonna shower?"

Sam looked dubious "Apparently there's such a thing as being too clean, who knew? I feel like I need to go roll in the mud or something."

"Yup, you smell funny" Dean sniffed and pulled a face "I got an idea, how 'bout we go to the Sloppy Tuna and you find the guitar chick and ask her to help you get dirty." he waggled his eyebrows suggestively.

"De-an!" Sam's objection seemed a little half-hearted to his big brother.

"What's her name anyway?"

Sam mumbled something, then sighed "Her names Samantha Agua"

"Sam and Sammy sittin' in a tree..." Dean sang.

"Shut up Dean, what are you? like 12!"

"Na uh, I'm just happy, my little bros actin human for once, go pretty ya self up" he looked his brother up and down critically "an' no flannel!"

Sam gave his brother a half-hearted shove but Dean smirked to see his baby brother take his advice.

...

At least this time they'd ordered the food, before the girl turned up, Dean thought wryly. Sam was in another world, again; his puppy dog eyes were trained on the blonde woman on the stage area like a starving basset hound. While his long fingers rolled the fragment of blue glass from the beach back and forth restlessly, betraying the anxiety brewing behind his hazel eyes and floppy hair.

How Sammy could still be such a nervous little boy about women Dean had never worked out, he'd tried to instil some of his own cocky self-confidence with the fairer sex, in his baby brother over the years.

How he'd tried! But Sammy still seemed to think he was a weedy 12-year-old, unaware of how many women watched him cross the room with frank speculation. They'd still be sitting here in a month with Sam dithering and mooning if Sammy was left to his own devices Dean thought sourly. It was up to big brother to move things along a bit. Moving away down the bar he waved to the bar keeper "The singer chick take requests?" He queried slipping a few extra bills across the bar with their drink order.

...

One of the bar staff walked over to Samantha Agua and had a quick discussion the girl gestured in Sam and Deans direction and the two women glanced over and giggled.

"Sam this one goes out to you, your brother says ask for my number already!" Then, the woman flipped her hair and launched into an updated version of Bob Segers "Night moves."

Sam nearly choked on his drink and shot his brother a horrified angry look, then hunched lower in distress.

Dean chuckled and clapped him on the shoulder before deserting him to stew in his mortification, going in search of the pool table. Sam wasn't sure if he wanted to die or kill his brother... maybe both.

After a few more songs, the guitar playing singer took a break. Sam looked up from his mortified contemplation of the blue green glass in his fist, to find her standing over him.

"So, Sam do you want to ask for my number?"

Sam gave her an aw-shucks grin "Is there a man alive that wouldn't?" He breathed.

Apparently, that was the right answer, "A group of us are going to have a bonfire down on the beach later, do you, and your brother want to join us?"

Sam looked up into blue eyes as deep as the sea and couldn't imagine anywhere he'd rather go.

 **A/N: A bonfire on the beach, some beers, a gorgeous girl or two. I think I've found the Winchester boys a happy place... what could possibly go wrong.**

 **Reviews pretty please, they'll help make the next chapter longer! By the way can anyone think of a prank to top the cat hair in the impalas air vent... Helpful mortification by big brother doesn't seem quite enough of a revenge, but 4 kids at home all day (yay schools out!) and pre-Christmas brain freeze has struck.**


	13. Chapter 13

**Chapter 13 (unlucky for some)**

The driftwood fire burnt with blues and greens flaring in its depths.

Dean nursed his beer feeling deeply content as he watched his little brother across the fire, sharing a bottle of beer, chatting and laughing with the blonde woman by his side.

The Jessica look-a-likes friends were all pretty, interested and appeared willing. But right now, he was happy just to fade into the background and watch his little brother. He wondered if this was how it could have been if he'd walked out on Dad and gone with Sammy to Stanford (well not to Stanford, but maybe if he'd got a job at a garage nearby or something.) Dean handled the thought carefully by its edges, placing it aside like a delicate creature.

Don't go there he whispered to himself, but he couldn't help brushing the cobwebs off the dream the jinn had offered him all those years ago, it was a beautiful forbidden thing.

Only more beautiful, because in this one he'd still have had his bond with Sam. He imagined Sam young and happy an up and coming lawyer, engaged to Jess, maybe with a rugrat on the way. He imagined himself with a home, the same bed every night, waking up to the feel and smell of long brown hair and a warm body next to him...

But he realised it wasn't the face of the jinn dream girl or even Lisa he saw... but Amara.

Well it wasn't exactly new news, but given the circumstances, it was pretty screwed up.

A rueful mental shrug and he put it all aside. Settling into the moment with another mouthful of beer.

Tonight, was good, leave it at that.

...

Sam felt drunk, his skin was tingling his heart beat surged in his ears and he felt like he was spinning.

Every touch of Samantha's body against his side sent a pleasant ache through him.

Love, lust or simple need he didn't care. He just wanted it.

When Samantha stood up and took his hand his eyes met Deans across the fire.

...

Dean distangled himself from the two tipsy ladies either side of him and moved over to his brother and his date "Looks like you two are off, I'm sure you can give my brother a ride home" Dean rumbled clapping a hand on his little brother's and Samantha's shoulders approvingly.

At the contact the woman beside Sam gasped and looked up, surprised into Deans face, as if he was something amazing, but the look was quickly submerged. "Oh, I'm sure I can do that" she purred in reply.

Samantha took Sam's hand and led him away towards the sounds of surf and Dean watched him go with a proud grin on his face, "Hope you have fun Sammy" he murmured indulgently before settling back into the sand between the two young ladies. "I guess we've got the party to ourselves now" he rumbled pulling them both against his chest. They giggled and snuggled in closer.

...

Sam stood in the dark with Samantha looking out at the moonlit sea crashing against the coast. She turned to face him running her hand down his shirt front, her cool finger sliding beneath the fabric to run a nail down his skin, beneath. Her other hand reached up to cup his cheek, lips parted as she looked up at him. Eyes filled with need.

Then, a look of revulsion crossed her face. "What the hell" she snarled "what happened to you, you're, you're broken" she spat the words "I could have sworn... it's got to be the brother I want" with that she turned and stalked off.

Leaving Sam alone in the dark stunned, like a broken puppet with its strings cut.

For a few long minutes, Sam stood blinking in shock, then turned and trudged back towards the fire.

As he neared the fire he saw Dean, then Samantha. She walked straight up to his brother, wrapped her arms around him and kissed him.

The sight plunged a blade into Sam's guts and stole the breath from his lungs.

Spinning on his heel, Sam lurched away from the scene of betrayal and sprinted into the night.

...

When Samantha neared the fire without Sam in tow, Dean climbed to his feet, aiming to ask where Sam was.

Then, Samantha wrapped her arms around him and kissed him.

For a second Dean was too shocked to react. "Wo-oh I think you've had too much to drink, girl! Wrong brother!" he muttered pushing her away gently.

She looked at him stunned and surprised.

"I think I better take these two home" he muttered pulling his two new, partially drunk lady friends to their feet and leading them back towards the impala without a look back.

 **A/N And you thought this chapter would end differently... so did poor Sam...**

 **I'm not that kind of fanfic writer guys *amused smile* Reviews please! ...to help fuel the angst yet to come.**


	14. Chapter 14

**Chapter 14**

The storm hit suddenly, one moment it was a quiet moonlit night.

The next, dark clouds rolled in blocking out the moon. The wind howled and the sea was whipped into a snarling monster trying to devour the land. Grumbles of thunder preceded clashes of lightening, then the rain began. In seconds Sam's dress shirt, light jacket and jeans were plastered to his skin by the icy down pour. Sam hunched in on himself, kneeling in the sand where his headlong flight had finally ceased. Clawing straggling hair out of his face Sam climbed laboriously to his feet and began the trudge back along the coastline shoulders drooped and feet dragging through the soggy seagrass, drift wood and uneven sand.

When he finally reached the bonfire, it was nothing but greasy ashes and blackened, drowned wood. The beach was empty and the impala gone.

The walk back to the motel was a long one, but, the roiling thoughts inside his head kept him company.

Of course, Samantha didn't want him, he was a fool to think anyone would.

She was right, he was broken, dirty, unclean.

Of course, Dean was the one she wanted, he was used to that.

Always second best, the least loved son.

To blame for his mother's death, never good enough for his father.

Dean was always Bobby's favourite.

The popular one in the never-ending round of new schools.

Hell, even Cas had a 'profound bond' with Dean.

Just as Lucifer was chasing better options.

The only person who had ever looked at him for himself was Jess...

But that was only because she had never really met Dean, or compared them. If she had she'd have walked away from him, without a second glance, like Samantha.

Sam swallowed and wiped his wet face with his fist. It was only the rain he told himself. Exhaling in dejection Sam trudged onwards, the rain sliding freezing fingers beneath his collar and down his spine, reminding him of Toni Bevell's cold shower.

Again, and again his thoughts circled to the image of Dean and Samantha clinched together. The impala gone from the car park.

How could Dean do that to him?

Dean, the one person, he thought, he truly thought, loved him most.

Samantha was nothing to him, just another skirt to chase... so how could he...?

Resentment flared. The longer the image of Samantha and Dean together circled in Sam's head the hotter the resentment flared, jealousy smouldered. Soon his head thumped with equal parts pain and anger.

When he finally reached the motel room the impala wasn't there and the room was empty.

Dean hadn't come back. It was all the evidence Sam needed.

Enraged beyond enduring he pounded his fists into the wall, feeling the dry wall disintegrate beneath the tacky wallpaper and the skin above his knuckles split. Swearing, he watched the blood drip down his long fingers onto the floor, his head was pounding and he slumped onto the floor by the bed suddenly dizzy.

...

Dean had dropped the two women home by the time the storm hit. The little redhead had invited him in 'for a coffee' but his musings about Amara left him feeling weary and disinterested.

As the rain sheeted down and thunder rumbled, visibility was instantly nothing.

He pulled the impala over to the shoulder to wait out the worst of it, his head was pounding like the worst hangover ever and he felt dizzy and sick. Resting his hands and forehead on the impalas steering wheel, he closed his eyes trying to collect himself.

...

When Dean woke, the storm was gone and the sun was high, groaning he straightened wondering how he could have drunken so little the night before and feel so awful this morning.

He was sure Sammy would tell him it was a sign of encroaching old age. Massaging the back of his neck he wondered how Sam's night had gone.

Somehow, he was sure Sammy wouldn't have gotten much sleep last night (assuming his date wasn't too drunk.)

It was a turn up for the books that, he Dean, had spent the night alone in his Baby while his kid brother was the one that got himself laid.

A sunny smile found its way to his lips despite how crappy he was feeling, it seemed they really did live in a world where anything could happen. It made him feel pretty hopeful, really.

He wanted, no he needed, pie and coffee.

...

Dean sauntered in the door whistling and grinning carrying coffee and drawled

"Mornin' lover boy" it was too much for Sam.

He rounded on his brother and punched him in the jaw.

Dean flew back into the wall with a thud and the coffee he'd been carrying exploded against the wall.

Dazed and drenched in coffee Dean looked up at his looming brother,

"What the Hell? Sam!"

"I saw you with Samantha" his brother raged "I know where you've been all night." Dean watched his brother draw back his foot as if to kick him in the ribs, then lurch away from him and out the door. The door slammed rattling in its frame and Sam was gone before his brother could even collect himself.

...

Sam found his way to "Naturally Good Foods and Cafe." The place reminded him of his brother. His stupid, jack ass, fake tanning, salad penancing, betraying brother! But he seemed to have run out of steam to run any further.

He sat on a stool at the lunch counter turning the sliver of blue glass over and over in his hands while his undrunk coffee went cold in front of him.

The hippy chick waitress ambled over to offer him a refill, again.

"What've you got there, honey?" She asked gesturing to the glass.

"Just some sea glass" he shrugged offering it up to her.

"Oh, no, it isn't, sweet heart, I know my gems and minerals young man" she said handing it back and wrapping his fingers around it.

"What you've got there is a piece of Beryl, also known as Aquamarine."

 **A/N: Poor Dean, poor Sam. Women are sooo much trouble.**

 **Oh and look it wasn't just a bit of blue glass after all - - is it significant? Who knows eh? But it's pretty to look at and Sammy keeps playing with it. I had a similar bit of stone in my motorbike jacket pocket for years, so maybe I just wanted to give Sammy a pet rock. Please send me more reviews because I'm asking nicely...or I'm going to drop down to posting chapters once a week. Yeah, well, possibly not. Thanks to the people who have started following recently at least I know someone's interested *sniffle* I think I've got ficwriters ailment... the addiction to reviews, it's a sad state of affairs! the problem is like all hard drugs after a while you have to up the dose to get the same high. I'm not saying it's good or healthy, I'm simply saying it's how the world works.**


	15. Chapter 15

**Chapter 15**

By the time Dean climbed to his feet to chase after his little brother, Sam was gone. When he called, Sam's phone went straight to voice mail. The whole thing was bizarre, the way Sam had drawn his foot back to kick him, it left him cold, the rage in Sam's eyes.

Had he done something to deserve all this?

'I saw you with Samantha' 'I know where you've been all night.'

The girl was drunk, she'd kissed him by mistake, he hadn't done anything to deserve this, had he?

For a second Dean wasn't sure, his mind clawing back over the oddly fuzzy, distorted memories from the previous night. He remembered the kiss.

The girl was drunk, she'd kissed him by mistake, he hadn't done anything to deserve Sam's rage, had he?

He hadn't led her on, had he? He'd said less than ten words to her, hadn't he?

Dean blinked grinding his knuckles into his aching eyes and slumped onto the bed, then looked down at himself, suddenly aware he was soaked in coffee.

Coffee, he'd bought Sammy coffee even though he wasn't sure Sam would be back from his night with Samantha.

Damn, how hard had Sam hit him? He fingered his split lip and felt his jaw, the answer was pretty darned hard, but there was no real damage, he'd had worse a million times.

Dean climbed to his feet to examine himself in the mirror.

But stopped halfway to the bathroom surveying the dents in the wall and the splatters of blood on the floor. Sam's clothes from last night were in a soggy sandy heap on his bed.

What the hell?! Sam was usually neat nearly to the point of OCD. Blood was smeared on the clothes and bedding. None of this made sense, was Sam hurt? Again, he dialled his brother.

"Come on Sammy pick up the phone damn it!" Again, it dropped straight to answer phone.

Worry clamoured at him, what'd happened here?

"I saw you with Samantha" - So, Sam had seen her kiss him.

"I know where you've been all night" - Where had he been all night? ….He'd dropped the girls off home,…. then the storm had hit. And…. he'd pulled off the road…. He remembered the feel on laying his forehead against the cool leather or Baby's steering wheel. Then nothing. Nothing until he woke up next morning.

That, in itself was odd, all he'd had to drink last night was beer, let's face it he'd been drinking whiskey straight by the gallon for years and last night he'd blacked out after what, 4 beers?

"I know where you've been all night"

He wouldn't have. Would he? Surely, he'd never stoop so low as to scr-w the girl he knew his brother was so hot for. Surely not... Would he? He'd walked away from her at the beach, taken the other two home.

The girl was drunk, she'd kissed him by mistake, he hadn't done anything to betray his brother….. Had he?

He looked again at the craters in the wall, the wet sandy clothes on Sam's bed, the blood on the floor.

Again, he dialled, again straight to answer phone.

The craters in the wall were Sam fist sized, the blood on the floor only splatters, from superficial wounds like split knuckles. Sam hadn't moved like he was hurt, Dean had spent years, after hunts, assessing how hurt his little brother was by the smallest detail.

So, Sam was physically ok? ... Yeah...

But Sam was mad at him, furious even.

His brother had always been mercurial, thunder and lightning, vicious words and recriminations. He could make you bleed with words, turn you inside out and gut you with his logic. Dean had no illusions about Sam, he could be a manipulative, vicious little shit at times.

The problem was he could turn on a dime and be just as remorseful, earnest and heart wrenchingly repented. He could break your heart with his vulnerability like he was a tiny child stuffed in that giant lanky body. He could make you feel like you were the most important person in the universe and when he looked at you with belief, you felt you could do anything.

Sam could make you feel an inch tall or a hundred feet tall and bulletproof.

Dean knew all that, Dean accepted all that, it was just Sam.

Sam was mad at him and Dean had no idea if he deserved it.

Again, he dialled Sam's number. Again straight to answer phone.

Looking down at the coffee drying and going stiff in his shirt and pants Dean gave a mental shrug. Well there wasn't anything he could do but clean up the mess now, could he? He picked up Sam's wet clothes off his bed and dumped them on the scummy coffee puddle against the wall. Stripping off his own clothes he headed to clean up, wondering what to do next about the case.

After all, they still had a job to do. Hunting things and saving people, the family business.

Waiting for the shower to heat up, Dean combed his fingers back through his blonded hair, feeling particles of sea grit scrape against his scalp.

So, he hadn't showered since the beach and he didn't smell of anything but wood smoke and coffee so maybe he was in the clear, innocent of Sam's wrath. A misunderstanding that would blow over. He just wished he knew for sure.

There was something very wrong about this whole thing, Dean mused as the warm water stung his split lip.

...

Towelling his hair, feeling slightly irritated by the blonde, Dean pondered.

What to next in the monster of the week hunt?

Cracking the laptop, he checked the emails. There was one from the sourpuss lady coroner. The outstanding lab results, were finally here.

Damn! Why wasn't Sam here for this? He scanned the results trying to work out if anything was significant.

Then he caught a vaguely familiar word

Oxytocin: significantly above normal ranges.

Dean stared at the word trying to remember where he knew that word from.

Then he remembered...

"Son-of-a-bitch" he rasped in horror.

Another town, another lady coroner, one of the worst cases they'd tackled and it had taken Bobby's intervention to pull their asses out of the fire that time…before they'd killed each other.

"It's a f cking siren" Oh Chuck he needed to find that bronze dagger, his eyes fell on the splatters of Sam's blood on the floor, he just hoped it would be enough.

 **A/N: So, it's a siren? Or is it? Dean sure thinks it is and he's got Sam's blood and I know there's a bronze dagger in the trunk, so that's all good….. So everything will be ok won't it? Is Sam safe hanging out at a vegan hippy cafe? And will the boys ever end up building that ruddy sandcastle? *Evil grin* Give me an appropriate offering of reviews and follows and I might tell you before Christmas.**

 **A virtual imaginary chocolate fish to anyone who can fit all the prices together.**


	16. Chapter 16

**Chapter 16**

So, the working theory was that the fuglie of the week was a siren, that it had gotten to Sammy and all that explained Sam attacking him. He was pretty sure the siren was Samantha.

All the other victims had gone missing in the late afternoon or early evening, so Dean figured he had time to gank the bitch before Sam was in too much danger.

That said he was getting desperate to find his baby brother

"Damn it Sam I'm getting you a GPS tracking collar, answer your frickin' phone already, please man! Samantha's a siren"

Dean knelt on the motel floor, pouring a few drops of holy water on the splatters of blood dried there, scraping at each one with the bronze dagger and smearing the resulting gunk over the point and blade.

"Sammy, what is it and you and banging monsters?" Dean sighed rubbing his fragile head. Last time the siren had hooked him, so he wasn't exactly one to accuse Sam.

At least Sammy's siren was playing at being a girl, to hook Sam, not a replacement little brother. He really didn't want to remember how it had been all those years ago.

His mind shied away from an unbidden memory of holding a knife to Sam's throat watching the blood trickle down at the bidding of the last siren they'd encountered, G-d he'd near killed Sam with an axe for the last frickin' one ... he definitely wasn't sharing a hip flask with anyone without wiping the rim, ever again.

Sliding the blade under his Fed suit jacket Dean headed out to try and find Sammy and Samantha.

...

"Aquamarine? That's a birth stone, right?" Sam queried glad of a distraction from his thoughts.

"It's my birth stone" Marie, the hippy waitress informed him "but aquamarine also has all sorts of mystic properties" she sashayed behind the counter and pulled out a very new age looking book sliding it in front of Sam and flicking it open to a page on Aquamarine.

oooooooooooooooooooooOoooooooooooooooooooooo

 _ **Introduction to the Meaning and Uses of Aquamarine**_

 _Aquamarine evokes the purity of crystalline waters, and the exhilaration and relaxation of the sea. It is calming, soothing, and cleansing, and inspires truth, trust and letting go. In ancient lore, Aquamarine was believed to be the treasure of mermaids, and was used by sailors as a talisman of good luck, fearlessness and protection. It was also considered a stone of eternal youth and happiness._ _[Simmons, 49]_ _Today it protects all who travel by, over, or near water, and opens the channels of clear and heartfelt communication._

 _The name Aquamarine comes from the Latin aqua marinus, meaning "water of the sea," and refers to its sparkling ocean-like color. The pale blue, transparent crystal is a member of the Beryl family. Its color, sometimes bluish green, is caused by iron oxides within the chemical makeup of the stone. Ancient seer considered it to be under the influence of the moon, an orb exerting very great magnetic influence. Present day supporters of crystal-gazing suggest that when using an Aquamarine to view coming events, do so when the moon is increasing. The magnetism of the moon on the included iron oxides will strengthen the stone's forecasting ability._

 _Aquamarine embodies all things connected to the sea, as well as those things relating to Heaven reflected on the surface of the water. It becomes a mirror, reflecting itself indefinitely, making it possible to discover hidden meanings of reality. As a stone of symmetries, it is conducive for meditation and revelation, a stone of prophets, shamans, healers, and mystics. It also allows us to explore the darkest depths of our souls, face to face with ourselves, and with others._ _[Megemont, 31-32]_

 _Aquamarine is the blue variety of Beryl, though the Beryl family forms in other colors used as gems, such as green Emerald, yellow Heliodor and Golden Beryl, pink Morganite, Red Beryl or Bixbite, and the colorless variety, Goshenite._

 _ **Aquamarine Uses and Purposes - Overview**_

 _Associated with the Throat chakra, Aquamarine helps overcome the fear of speaking, and is an excellent stone for teachers and presenters of all types. It relaxes speakers to a stage of consciousness in which they are fully aware of their own truths, wisdom and feelings, and able to articulate them with clarity and conviction. It also allows one to speak clearly and without anger in difficult situations._ _[Simmons, 49][Ahsian, 50]_

 _Aquamarine accelerates the intellectual reasoning processes and enhances the ability for rapid response. It makes one unconquerable through learning, not only about the physical world, but about oneself._ _[Melody, 128]_ _It bestows perseverance, discipline and light heartedness._ _[Gienger, 16]_

 _Aquamarine encourages the ideal of service to the world and to the development of a humanity attuned to healing. It emits a gentle and compassionate energy, promoting moderation and responsibility for ones' actions. It inspires judgmental people to be more tolerant, and helps those overwhelmed by responsibility to find order._ _[Melody, 129][Hall, 68]_

 _A stone of natural justice, Aquamarine utilizes compromise and negotiation, and gives quiet courage and clear reasoned words in confrontational situations. Pass Aquamarine over any written complaints you receive or before you send any out, wear or carry Aquamarine when visiting your child's school because of a complaint, or when resolving neighborhood disputes over parking or boundaries._ _[Eason, 218]_

 _As a travel crystal, greenish blue Aquamarine protects those who journey by sea, alleviating the fear of water, and guards those involved in any long-haul travel such as flying or driving long distances._ _[Eason, 42]_ _It is a good stone for learning to swim._ _[Eason, 218]_

 _As a love crystal, pale blue Aquamarine encourages a lover to return, helps two people with different lifestyles to live together in harmony, and reduces the effects of sensitive issues that cause quarrels. [Eason, 43] Aquamarine is often given as a love token or eternity ring, and increases commitment and fidelity "as long as the waters of the earth flow."_ _[Eason, 218]_

 _ **Aquamarine Physical Healing Energy**_

 _Aquamarine is a stone of breath, the respiratory tract, and the lungs. It can heal sinus conditions and frequent coughing, and is effective for hay fever and other chronic allergies._ _[Megemont, 32][Gienger, 16]_ _It relieves colds and bronchitis._ _[Eason, 218]_

 _Aquamarine is a cooling stone, countering infections and useful for laryngitis, strep throat or a sore throat._ _[Ahsian, 50]_ _It harmonizes the pituitary and thyroid glands, regulating hormones and growth._ _[Hall, 68][Gienger, 16]_ _It is beneficial for teeth and gum problems._ _[Eason, 218]_

 _It supports the healing of inflammatory diseases of all kinds, and is soothing to eczema, hives, rosacea and psoriasis. It may also help prevent outbreaks of herpes._ _[Ahsian, 50]_ _Some skin diseases caused by allergies may be cured by Aquamarine, and can complement the treatment for shingles._ _[Megemont, 32]_

 _Tired eyes and some vision problems can be relieved if Aquamarine is placed on the eyelids for 20 minutes every night. Placed on the solar plexus, it will calm nervous spasms._ _[Megemont, 32]_

 _ **Aquamarine Emotional Healing Energy**_

 _Aquamarine is a Water element stone, powerful for cleansing the emotional body and opening communication. Its gentle energy brings emotional patterns to the surface and assists in understanding the reason for holding onto old thoughts or patterns that are limiting forward motion. It also identifies where ego is causing one to overreact, assume a victim/abuser role, manipulate others, or martyr oneself. By consciously releasing these patterns, it allows for better relationships, love and compassion._ _[Ashian, 50]_

 _Aquamarine helps balance excessive anger or fear, and clears past emotional, physical or verbal abuse. It is an excellent stone for children who have been through traumatic situations and are acting out aggressively or who have disassociated from their emotional bodies. [Ahsian, 50] It heals the effects of over-judgmental parents who set impossible standards, and panic attacks lingering from guilt and inadequacy into adulthood._ _[Eason, 218]_

 _Aquamarine is useful for moving through transition and change, its cleansing energy removing resistance and helping one overcome fear of the unknown. It helps not only in the release of emotional baggage, but the clearing out of physical items and clutter._ _[Ahsian, 50]_

 _ **Aquamarine Chakra Healing and Balancing Energy**_

 _Aquamarine is perhaps the strongest stone for clearing and activating the_ _Throat Chakra._ _It stimulates energy from the heart to the throat, allowing one's deepest and heartfelt truth to be communicated._ _[Ahsian, 50]_

 _The Throat Chakra is the voice of the body, a pressure valve that allows the energy from the other chakras to be expressed. If it is blocked or out of balance, it can affect the health of the other chakras. In balance, it allows for the expression of what we think and what we feel. We can communicate our ideas, beliefs, and emotions. When the throat chakra is in balance and open, we can bring our personal truth out into the world. We have an easy flow of energy within the body and spirit. The energy that springs upward from the lower chakras can continue its path enabling free expression and natural release._

 _ **Aquamarine Spiritual Energy**_

 _Aquamarine is a stone of empowerment, for men and women alike. It helps in the realization that not all power comes from force. There is also power in aligning with the yielding, resilient vitality of life, and in promoting truthful and compassionate communication. It lends women the courage to express their inner knowing and enhances their intuitive abilities, and helps dispel the emotional numbness and difficulty men sometimes experience in communicating their feelings._ _[Simmons, 49]_

 _Aquamarine can be used as a gateway crystal to the Divine Feminine, both within the self, and in Her outer manifestations._ _[Simmons, 49]_

oooooooooooooooooooOoooooooooooooooooooooo

Looking up from the book Sam smiled his thanks,

"That was actually pretty interesting" he murmered "I've never really been interested in the powers of crystals, didn't think there was anything real to it... but maybe there is"

 **A/N the information on aqua marine comes from a website** **.com(slash)crystal-encyclopedia(slash)aquamarine**

 **Me personally, I don't believe in any of that crystals crap; being a scientist and all. But I don't see that being a good enough reason not to use a great plot device when its washed up by the sea. If I was looking for some crystal woowoo stuff it seems aquamarine would do our boys some good don't ya think?**

 **Come on reviewers have you spotted it yet? What's our monster of the week? The virtual chocolate fish is still up for grabs… its 100% sugar fat and guilt free you can't say that about most of the Christmas confectionary we are being tempted by at the moment.**


	17. Chapter 17

**A/N: I thought I'd be nice and give you another chapter quickly since the previous one was mostly regurgitated info about aquamarine rather than actual story. Be nice and shoot me an extra review if you read the two chapters together, it makes me feel loved and more enthusiastic about moving things along quicker. The virtual choccie fish (do other countries have chocolate fish? They are Lovely mouthfuls of marshmallow and caramel goodness dipped in chocolate) is still up for grabs.**

 **Chapter 17**

Dean was beginning to get frantic, time was crawling, then leaping on and still he hadn't seen or heard from Sam. Still he couldn't find any useful intel on Samantha's current place of residence, Dean was beginning to wonder if the woman lived in the sea or under a rock.

The sickening fear that Sammy was somewhere with that whore scr-wing his brains out, while she whispered murderous sweet nothings in his ear, screamed like an air raid siren through his brain.

Dean pounded his fists against the steering wheel with a snarl of frustration.

"Think damn it!"

Then it occurred to him that there were two people that had to know Samantha a little better than the bar staff and owner of the Sloppy Tuna, the two girls he'd given a ride home to the night before.

...

It was a process of elimination, Deans memories from the night before were fractured and vague. He'd just followed the girl's directions.

But he found his way back to the little redhead's door.

The girl looked surprised and hopeful seeing Dean again. Then even more surprised when he flashed a FBI badge.

"Hi" he favoured her with a come hither, killer smile "do you remember me?"

"Yeah, thanks for the ride home, are you here on business? I didn't realise you were a Fed" She looked a little crestfallen and embarrassed.

"Sometimes business can lead to, pleasant circumstances" he rumbled, inwardly chaffing at the little dance, wanting to just pick the girl up and shake her until the information fell out.

"Oh well, please come in, then" she smiled brightly at him ushering him inside.

"What I'm here for work wise, is about Samantha Agua and the young man that she was with last night. We have reason to believe they're in danger. How well do you know Samantha?"

"Well, to be honest, not that much." The words plunged Dean into despair "she's always been sort of … distant and she's only been in town a short while."

"So, you wouldn't know where I could get a hold of her?"

"Oh, she lives out in a beach batch along the coast, my friend Amy and I gave her a lift home one day, after that creepy old man Lenny started following her round trying to give her tacky jewellery."

"Can you give me the address?"

"Sure" She wrote it down, along with directions and her own name and number "will Samantha be ok?" She fluttered, fixing him with large brown eyes.

"I'm hoping it's just precautionary, she has a restraining order out against an ex, a nasty piece of work... and he's escaped from prison." Dean assured her, laying the ground work to explain any disappearances down the track.

"Oh well, that explains a bit."

Dean shot her a smile. "Well thanks for the info, all the info" his voice was warm chocolate, he waved the paper "I better go check up on her... but I certainly owe you a drink, for your help."

The flirty smile dropped off Deans face as soon as the door closed. Sliding his hand up he fingered the hilt of the bronze dagger and strode back to the impala.

Sam, Sam, Sam, Sam his brother's name thudded steadily inside his head along with his heartbeat as he accelerated away from the curb.

...

The beach batch was fairly close to town, but isolated down a little side road.

Dean would have completely missed if it wasn't for the girl's meticulous directions, for a second Dean was profoundly glad he'd given her a ride home instead of leaving her on the beach the night before.

The place was just a two-room wooden shack, there was no car, just a beat up looking bike leaning against the side wall, from where Dean crouched binoculars trained on it, he could make out Samantha sitting at a wooden table with her back to him staring at something in front of her.

Sam was nowhere to be seen, but Dean was guessing his little brother was probably stashed in the bedroom, round back where he couldn't see. He was probably shackled to the bed. This was, so, not what Dean had been hoping for when his little brother had fixed puppy eyes on the blonde Jessica look-a-like.

Moving cautiously as a cat Dean stalked closer.

As he slid through the shacks door, bronze dagger hidden, hand behind his back, Samantha turned from gazing at the round blueish globe of glass in front of her and smiled.

"Ahh, Dean what a lovely surprise" she purred looking completely unsurprised by his arrival.

"Where's my brother, what have you done with him, you b-tch?" Dean snarled moving closer.

"Language" the woman tutted "I have no idea where that useless brother of yours is, why would I care, when I've got you?"

Dean blinked in surprise "You're lying, f-cking siren bitch!"

"Oh?" The blue eyes held a modicum of surprise "you think I'm a siren?" Her laughter tinkled like bells.

"You are, and you're going to die, you murdering b-tch"

A coolly amused smile graced the pretty face "So you're a hunter? How lovely... not a very good one obviously... but still, I might enjoy expanding your education a bit. A girl gets lonely with no one to talk to."

Dean launched himself forward and plunged the bronze dagger into her heart.

 **A/N p.s How on earth does one edit these fanfic documents once they're posted I finally read through everything I've got so far, and discovered a few errors - to my great mortification (thanks for not saying anything guys I guess the spelling and grammar police haven't found me yet phew!)**


	18. Chapter 18

Chapter 18

Dean launched himself forward and plunged the bronze dagger into her  
heart.

Before he could even blink Samantha back handed the green-eyed hunter across the room, as if he weighed nothing, his head connected solidly with the wall and he slid down stunned.

The last thing Dean saw before he blacked out was the blonde woman casually pull the blade out of her own chest and run her pale tongue contemplatively down the bronze edge.

...

Sam sighed and ran his fingers through his hair. He needed to get over himself, he was mad at Dean, but they still had a job to do.

The case comes first, the other stuff works around it or gets shelved, it was a rule John Winchester had drummed into them.

Sam took a steadying breath, Dean was a world class prick at times, but he Sam, could be the bigger man.

He fingered the sliver of aquamarine in his hand and considered the things he'd read in Marie's new age book, ok the crystal mystical properties thing was -probably- crap but it was also kind of appropriate to the current situation. Seemed there was a need for 'helping two people with different lifestyles to live together in harmony, and reducing the effects of sensitive issues that cause quarrels.' Sam figured shoving the bit of blue stone up his brother's ass might well help dispel his emotional numbness, and it definitely would help him Sam communicate his feelings!

...

When Sam returned to the room, neither Dean nor the impala were there.

Well, to be honest maybe that was a good thing, Sam wasn't sure he wanted to look at his brother yet, the whole thing cut too deep. Sam eyed the wall, where he had punched a hole in it, noting Dean had cleaned his blood off the floor and the coffee off the wall, a tiny flicker of regret found its way through to his heart.

Dean had spent his whole life cleaning up Sam's messes, Sam rubbed the back of his neck considering the craters in the wall, suddenly the rage he'd felt….. seemed overblown. Excessive to the situation.

Samantha wasn't Jess, she was just some girl from a bar that looked like her. He'd wanted to kill his brother just because some girl chose Dean instead.

Sam blinked a few times and looked down at his battered hands in dismay for the first time truly feeling how they throbbed and ached.

If Dean was here he'd be fussing over them and making sure nothing was broken.

Sam bit his lip, suddenly remembering the sensation of his fist smashing into his brother's jaw and the ambushed look of shock in his big brothers eyes.

….. 

Wincing Sam immersed his hands in the motel hand basin to clean them up, scrubbing gingerly at the caked scabs and bruises. Frowning he rubbed at the three small scratches on the back of his hand working the soap in, turning over his hand he examined the small cut across the lifeline on his palm.

Watching the dirty water swirl down the drain he dried his hands deciding to forgo any attempts with bandages for now. His mind turned to the case, first he'd check emails, then maybe go back over some of the files he hadn't got to yet.

…

Dean had been at his laptop again, Sam stifled a sigh hoping not to stumble onto one of Deans unclosed porn sites.

Surprised Sam realised Dean had been checking case emails.

Stephanie Horowitz had finally got the extra lab results and forwarded them on.

Lots of inflammatory markers and high oxytocin levels, hmmm the oxytocin levels were not as high as in that Siren case they'd tackled, but they didn't seem to be naturally elevated, which made them relevant in the game of guess that monster.

Sam went to run his hands through his hair then thought better of it; considering the facts they had on the case, drownings, storms, something in the water with arms and hands, oxytocin. His fingers flew over the keys as he found the zone and forgot the pain on his hands.

… 

Hazel eyes widened in surprise as he realised where the trail led.

"A mermaid?" He breathed.

Well, that was definitely something they'd never run across before.

There was a first time for everything apparently.

Another thing, along with angels, that could come out of the 'imaginary stories for kids' box and fall firmly in the 'bloody big pain in the butt for hunters' box. Somehow Sam didn't think that this mermaid would resemble the little mermaid from the animated Disney movie very much. A half smile tugged at the side of his mouth remembering, a random memory from his childhood.

Dean singing a much dirtier version of one of the songs from the 1989 film, what had it been called. That's right "Kiss the girl" (though of course with Dean it had had much smuttier lyrics) a random image of a 13 year old leering Dean telling him that Ariel was hot. Thinking of Dean, Sam pulled out his phone.

Realising his phone was off, Sam turned it back on.

16 missed calls from Dean.

Dialling voice mail he sighed wearily.

With every message the confusion and worry in Deans voice deepened. 

"Damn it Sam! I'm getting you a GPS tracking collar, answer your frickin' phone already, Please man! Samantha's a siren" Deans final message was just shy of blind panic. 

Dean was wrong.

Sam looked down at the cuts on the back of his hand and palm with a sinking feeling, he realised where he'd seem the marks before. On the hands of the drowning victims.

Wrapping his fingers from the other hand around the lacerated one he matched his pointer, middle and ring finger to the cuts on the back of his hand and his thumb to the cut through his life line.

He remembered Samantha taking his hand just like that to lead him away, alone, down the beach.

Dean was also right.

 **A/N and the chocolate fish goes to *drum roll please* ngregory763 ! And the crowd goes wild... yep you are one of the smartest kids in the class, but I love all my reviewers equally, it's easy there's only like 5 of you *self deprecating smile* - I do love my reviewers more than you lurking watchers though (you guys sorta creep me out. Do you like what I'm doing here, hate it, or are you just standing round looking like gawkers at a horrific car accident to horrified by the carnage to look away...? Come on talk to me, pleeeaaassseeee! I'm not that scary honest!)**


	19. Chapter 19

**A/N: And a Merry Christmas to all of you out in fanfic land, I hope you all got everything you asked Santa for, me I go a small portable harddrive with every episode of "Supernatural" on it from hubby so I'm all good (Since Netflix took it away here in NZ and he got sick of me pouting.)**

 **Chapter 19**

Dean woke slowly, the pounding in his head and his prone position making him unsure if he was suffering from a hangover or a concussion. Until he tried to rub his crusted eyes and felt his hand's movement forestalled by resistance.

From the feel of it he seemed to be lying on a bed, tied to it.

There were plenty of occasions where he had woken to find himself tied up with a pounding head in the past, granted some of those occasions had involved copious amounts of alcohol and an adventurous and frisky companion, of the feminine persuasion. But for the most part, waking up with a splitting skull to find himself tied up, was a bad, bad sign.

Holding his breath, he listened intently trying to work out if he was alone, the room was still. Cracking his eyelids a fraction he surveyed what he could see of the room without giving away that he was awake.

He was in a sparsely furnished, wood panelled room containing a battered chest of draws, the bed he was on and a wooden chair. There was no sign of Sam or Samantha, was Sam even here?

"I have no idea where that useless brother of yours is, why would I care, when I've got you." The echo of Samantha's words whirled around jarringly in Deans throbbing skull, the contempt in her tone towards Sam had seemed genuine.

It was bizarre, who'd want him, Dean, in preference to Sammy? In Deans opinion, the only things Dean excelled his brother at were the things Sam couldn't be bothered with trying to master, though he'd never admit that to Sam.

What was the bitch anyway? He'd plunged that dagger into her heart and she hadn't missed a beat. Maybe he had it all wrong and Sammy hadn't been under the spell of her song after all.

Damn! He'd gone off half-cocked and what had it got him?

Tied to a bed.

Dean rolled his head to the side to try and look at what he was dealing with. The movement brought a whole new world of hurt clamouring through his abused skull, breathing carefully past the nauseating pain and dizziness Dean surveyed his wrists.

Awww f ck, frickin' cable ties!

One around his wrist so tight it cut into the flesh and one looped through that and around the solid cast iron bed frame. Why'd it have to be blasted cable ties?

Rope or hand cuffs you could get some wiggle room with, the only way to get blasted cable ties off, once they were on was to cut the bloody things, getting through the titanium based plastic took forever and you inevitably cut yourself to ribbons rather than the plastic. In Deans estimation cable ties were the work of something even more evil than Lucifer.

Just then the bedroom door opened. Dean didn't move, trying to breath like he was unconscious, hoping that his captor would think he was still out to it.

"Don't bother Dean, I know you're conscious" at Samantha's cool words Dean let out a breath and looked up her.

Drawing the wooden chair up beside the head of the bed she seated herself and studied him. She had the bronze dagger clenched loosely in one hand, she looked down at it thoughtfully then raised her eyes to meet his.

"I find myself rather curious about you" she waggled the knife "and your brother."

"What have you done with Sam, you bitch?!"

Raising the blade to her mouth she licked the bronze edge "Sadly, I let your brother slip through my fingers. It was the state of his soul, you see, totally shredded and stuck back together again with metaphysical chewing gum. Totally useless for my purposes." Again, she licked the blade "...and yet, his blood tastes strangely good. Addictive even... your brother is a conundrum, he tastes human, and yet not... and the state of his soul, how he's even alive like that - let alone walking around... it defies understanding."

Dean narrowed his eyes to glare at the thing that was pretending to be a blonde woman.

"And then there's you!" the cold blue eyes studied him "Quite frankly Dean I'm not sure if you're human either, your souls intact... and yet it's more... it's like you've got hundreds, no, thousands of other souls inside you. Not the people themselves, just the remnants, the flavour of the energy" She gave a breathy laugh "Oh G-d you're amazing" she licked her lips and studied him avidly.

"Pretty much, every woman that gets me into bed says that" Dean drawled back with a cocky smirk. "But enough about me, tell me all about you, darlin'. Tell me about your family and where you grew up, I know even monster chicks dig a guy who listens."

"Oh, very subtle, hunter boy, you're still trying to work out what I am?"

Dean shot her a rueful little boy smile "Come on honey, don't you want to educate me? Come on over here and maybe I can teach you a lesson of my own, I'll show you I'm a man, not a boy."

"Why not?" She reached out and ran a hand through her captive's short blonded hair making him jerk away.

"I'm a mermaid, we are practically immortal but we don't have souls, and having no souls we can't create or breed and there's no afterlife for us. There aren't many of us left and that's fine because we've never really liked our own kind. It was fine, until the sun began to die, but when the sand started running through the hourglass towards the end. I found I didn't just want to end." The mermaid pursed her lips "so I did something, there's a way we can get an immortal soul. We can take it from one of you, if we leave the sea and if you love us. But it starts another timer, and once you start the process you can't go back. Even if the bloody sun magically heals itself" she spat in irritation "and it's just not f cking working. All of the men I've tried, are too bloody puny. But you, you Dean should suit my purposes, admirably ... and you might even have enough left over to keep breathing." She patted his cheek and smiled down sunnily.

 **A/N well does that explain things? *rueful grin* Do you think Dean oughta tell Samantha it was him and his brother that broke and then fixed the frickin' sun? Winchester luck eh? Reviews please…. Pretty please…cos its Christmas and once I get enough reviews to fuel me I'll send you all a new chapter as a return gift.**

 **-Joyful Sunny NZ Christmas vibes to you all from this side of our green and blue globe.**

 **MC2**


	20. Chapter 20

**A/N: ngregory763 and Kathy this is for you ;-) though you're probably gonna wish I gave you more. I'm working on it, honestly I am.**

 **Chapter 20**

The sun was beginning to set, Sam sat in a stolen car watching the reds and oranges turning the ocean and sky to fire and blood.

He'd spent hours trying to find Dean, following every lead he could think of to track down Samantha. For most of that he'd been walking in his brother's footsteps, but now, all the leads were tapped out and still his brother and the impala were missing.

Samantha was nowhere to be found and he was pretty sure she had to have Dean.

What if it was too late? Sam eyed the setting sun with dread. What if, somewhere just out of sight, Samantha was leading his big brother into the ocean? Sam let out a shaky breath that sounded more like a moan in the small cars confined interior.

Sam picked up his cell again, he knew there was no point calling Cas, the enochian warding on Deans ribs would stop any attempts in that direction, he laid it down on the passenger seat, again exhaling through his fringe.

Briefly, Sam's mind went to his own time as Toni Bevelles captive, it was usually Dean doing the frantic searching for a missing brother and Sam found himself wishing for a role reversal, right now.

What if he couldn't find Dean in time? This was all his fault! How often had he let some she bitch monster in? How often had he thought he knew better, then ended up causing an almighty screw up? It was always the people he loved that payed. Sometimes it seemed he was cursed to burn everything he cared about.

What if this time Dean didn't make it?

It'd been years; but memories of that repeating Tuesday at Broward county's mystery spot, watching Dean die over and over. Then the Wednesday with no reset, months of living in a world without Dean, his only companion revenge ... floated to the surface like a drowned corpse.

He's moved on, really, he has, but he hasn't and that Asia song still brings him out in a cold sweat. So many times, he's faced his brother's death. All his life really, but still, he isn't immune to it.

Not like this! It was a prayer, though who he was praying to, he couldn't say.

Raking battered hands through his hair, tugging and using the pain to steady himself he tried to think of what to do next.

The case, there was a clue there if he could just find it, he could feel it like a hidden splinter.

His stomach grumbled, the sound surprising him and reminding him that he hadn't eaten since yesterday.

A wry smile twisted his mouth. That'd never happen if Dean was here, the smile slid off his face. Dean and food, he'd read somewhere that adults who suffer deprivation in childhood often made eating whenever they could, a sort of religion, subliminally unsure when the chance to eat again would come. Dean as a kid had so often gone hungry, so he, Sam could eat, all part of their screwed-up childhood. Sam swallowed thickly and ground his fists into his eyes, so many things he'd never thanked Dean for.

Sh t, he really needed to stop thinking, or at least think about something useful. He envied his brothers ability to live in the moment and just act instead of over-thinking every-blasted-thing.

Then again thinking a bit more might have kept Dean out of this situation. Starting the car again Sam wondered where Dean had gotten the "siren victims blood" to coat his bronze dagger, then remembered noticing how Dean had cleaned up his blood off the motel floor. "Necessity an' invention Sammy, necessity an' invention" the echo of his brother's voice came to him along with a flashing memory of his grin.

At that moment, it came to him, a conversation about local legends and rumours with the kid Scott from the volunteer Montauk fire Department.

"We locals don't give it any more credence than Lenny Nicole's drunken stories about how he saw a mermaid..." It wasn't much but it was a lead.

...

The man that opened the door was in his late 60s with receding patchy grey hair and all the cardinal signs of a man attempting to drown himself in a bottle, Sam felt a twinge of guilt as he held up the bottle of whiskey, that was the price of their meeting.

"Mr Nicole, I'm Simon West, we spoke on the phone, I'm a research assistant into folk law out of New York University. I hear you have a modern mermaid tale, I would love to hear." He shot the man earnest puppy dog eyes, but he needn't have bothered, the man ushered him inside eyes homed in on the bottle of whiskey in Sam's hands with anxious need.

The small flat was a dingy mess, dirty dishes and empty bottles covered every surface of the small kitchenette, dirty clothes and old newspapers were strewn over the sagging threadbare sofa and single arm chair, an old-style CRT TV crouched in one corner showing more static than picture. Sam eyed his surroundings trying to hide his distaste, if this was the alternative for old age, maybe dying bloody wasn't so bad.

Lenny filled a dirty coffee cup from the overflowing sink with whiskey, he waved a cup at Sam, trying to hide his horror Sam demurred with a shake of his head. The man drained most of the mug in one draft then sat down in the sagging armchair opposite, where Sam perched uneasily on the sofa.

"That's good stuff" Lenny breathed in appreciation "No one believes me, not about the mermaid, not about any of it. I'm just a crazy drunk to them."

"Well for me, Mr Nicole, it has nothing to do with belief. Your story is research, so I wouldn't worry about that."

The man nodded and launched into his tale.

...

"So, this woman, the singer from the bar. That you claim is your mermaid. You offered her aquamarine jewellery thinking that she could grant you a wish?" Sam clarified.

Lenny looked abashed "I know it sounds nuts, but I saw a movie about mermaids once and it said they could grant wishes... I just wanted my wife back, she was everything to me." The old drunk looked at Sam with beseeching eyes.

"I take it the young lady denied she was a mermaid? There definitely is mythology linked to mermaids granting wishes, but like most wish for fulfilment myths, things in those story's usually go sour fast, " Sam mused.

"Yeah, she denied it, took my aquamarine though, then made a big fuss and called the cops on me" Lenny looked uncomfortable "As for wishes you might be right. I followed her home and watched her, I saw her with two of the guys who later drowned. Not that anyone would believe me... I'm just a drunk crazy old man..."

Sam's heart was drumming in his ears "Can you tell me where I can find her?" Giving up, Sam took the plunge "PLEASE! I lied to you, this isn't just folk law research ….. She's got my brother, we came here to investigate the drownings and now he's missing." Sam's voice came out as a rasp of urgency.

"Yeah, I can help you. Maybe we're both crazy, but if we aren't, I guess it's my duty" the old man cracked a yellow toothed smile at Sam.

It was the most beautiful thing Sam'd ever seen.


	21. Chapter 21

**A/N writing this chapter traumatised the author, please feel free to skip it if you're sweet, innocent and sensitive (like me.) It contains a nasty mermaid molesting poor Dean, its short and contains no plot progression to speak of (so really we don't need it do we?) but it's here for those of you that like "That Sort of Thing." If I get enough reviews and follows out of it I might force myself to write more like this... here ya go ya reprobates don't say I do nothing for ya!**

Chapter 21

Deans head swum and his heartbeat pounded in his ears, G d it was the most terrible and awful thing he'd ever been through. But it felt amazing and despite himself he was beginning to want it. The blonde woman sat on the bed next to him stroking her cool hand down his now naked chest crooning softly. He looked up at her and swallowed thickly as she lent down to kiss him again, a tear trailed silently down his cheek as he forced himself to make the token resistance of trying to turn away. It didn't do any good, she had him tied and she was so inhumanly strong, her hands forced his face to hers. Another poisoned kiss. He found himself whimpering in the back of his throat, he'd like to say the sound was distress, but he couldn't kid himself, it was need.

Ah f ck! He was so scr-wed, a wry smile twisted his mouth. No, he wanted to be scr-wed.

A bark of laughter from her captive made the mermaid jerk back in surprise.

She frowned down in consternation uncertain what to make of the laughter.

"Dean, you are definitely, one of a kind" she trilled "I've never had a man resist me this long, you seem to have superhuman self-control."

Laughter bubbled from Deans throat "Don't you dare tell Sammy that, you bitch, he thinks I'd do anything female in the tri state area... maybe that's the problem you ain't female, you're a soulless fish." It was so hard forcing the words out, so hard... Dean began giggling despite himself.

So hard, yeah, he was that too.

When she slapped him, his vision greyed out for a second. When he could focus again she was standing across the room glaring at him.

A small victory.

"I see you're into the kinky stuff, how 'bout we change places and I tie you to the bed? We can pretend you're caught in a driftnet and I can cut you free... I promise to only slip a few times."

She strode across the room and raked her nails down his chest, blood bloomed sluggishly from the scratches, holding him down she ran her cold tongue over the wounds.

An inarticulate cry forced its way past Deans clenched teeth, Samantha's laughter was mocking.

She stepped back and favoured him with a pouting smile "I know you want me. You can't deny it."

"Well yeah" Dean admitted trying to keep the quaver out of his voice "but I'd rather have some pie right now."

The mermaid gave a small shriek of frustration and stormed out of the room.

Dean lay panting on the bed, aching.

Yeah, he was so scr-wed! And he wasn't sure he could keep it up. Rolling his face into the mattress he groaned at the double meaning in both those thoughts. His dirty mind might possibly be the death of him.


	22. Chapter 22

**A/N Upon consideration and rereading chapter 21 isn't that bad, I just needed to visit the hardware store to buy wood with hubby and get a coffee to get a bit of perspective on things. The puns are sort of amusing after all.**

 **Chapter 22**

Sam had burned up his minutes contacting every hunter he knew, no one had dealt with a mermaid before. Most laughed at him. The man of letters files weren't much help either, Sam hated going in blind.

But there wasn't much he could do, she had Dean and every moment he wasted could be the difference between a hunter's pyre and ear bashing his big brother for going off half cocked.

At the sight of the impala gleaming darkly in the moonlight, half concealed in her position behind some scrubby bushes, Sam let out a breath.

Pulling up his stolen car beside the love of his brother's life, Sam slid out.

There was a feeling of home as Sam ran his hand down the cars cool flank.

"Hi girl, good to see you" he murmured popping the trunk to survey the weapons.

The only things missing were a pair of binoculars, one of the hand guns and the bronze dagger. Sam eyed his brothers treasured grenade launcher thoughtfully, before starting to arm himself in a through and sensible fashion.

From what Lenny had told him, Samantha's place was about a mile ahead, within the sight of the ocean.

Geared up and ready to go Sam transferred the sliver of aquamarine from his pocket to his mouth, between his cheek and his teeth, he didn't know why exactly but sometimes it payed to listen to intuition.

...

Samantha had been gone a fair while now and Dean found his head pounding and his eyesight swimming in a familiar way. Wincing Dean rubbed the cable ties binding him to the bed back and forth steadily.

There were no rough spots on the frame and no flex room so he guessed he could probably keep doing this for the next 20 years with very little effect, he'd probably wear through his flesh and bleed out before the evil cable ties showed the slightest scuff. But it was something to do and the pain from his abused wrists and ankles helped clear the clamour of the mermaid poison somewhat.

He thought about Sam's experience with Toni Bevell and for the first time truly understood how Sammy must have felt about the whole thing.

For Dean, sex and the things surrounding it, had always been a fun thing, this was so, so far from fun!

He'd tried to understand and say the right things to Sam, all those weeks ago, but lying here tied to a bed, waiting for the nasty little bitch to come back. He now realised, how many light years he had been away, from getting how the whole experience must have screwed with Sam's head.

Sam always confused sex with love, or maybe, they just always just went together for his earnest, heart on his sleeve kid brother.

Dean found himself profoundly grateful to Lucifer for the first time in his life, if the evil son-of-a-bitch hadn't shredded his brother's soul in the cage, it'd be Sammy tied to the bed right now, drowning on mermaid poison and endorphins. Some biblical reference floated to the surface of his mind, something about God working all things for good... damn, he hoped he wasn't catching religion on top of everything. His feelings toward Chuck held to little sense he mostly shoved them in the "Leave it the F ck alone" box.

However, he had no illusions how long Sammy could have held out against the Jessica look-a-likes advances. He'd been half gone just looking at her, from across the room.

Samantha had been gone a long time now, he wondered if she'd gone to the bar to sing or whether she was up to something worse. Her talk about Sam's blood being addictive wasn't very reassuring.

He wondered if Sam had worked out he was missing yet.

He wondered if Sam was pulling his hair out trying to track him down.

It seemed whenever the two of them split up, one of them ended up in trouble.

He wondered if things ended badly whether Mom would finally come home.

Somehow, he was sure she would, for Sam. It was good that Sam would have her, come what may.

...

Sam crouched low trying to move as unobtrusively as possible, through the moonlit low scrub and sea grass that seemed to be Montauk's endemic coastal flora. His extra inches were just a pain at moments like this.

The shape of Samantha's residence came into view as the sound of the surging ocean filled the night with rushing whispers.

The sound would have been pleasant if it didn't cover and obscure every other sound in the night, the moonlight played tricks with Sam's depth perception as he approached the small wooden building his eyes drawn towards the brightly lit windows.

The jolt and the sensation of falling took Sam by surprise. The lithe shape kneeling over him in the moonlight and the cool feeling of moist lips over his followed him down, into a darkness that held no stars.

 **A/N Well look at it this way, at least the boys will be back together once Samantha drags his sasquatch butt back to the cabin.**


	23. Chapter 23

**A/N:** **Warning this has things in common with Chapter 21 but it doesn't even have the puns, you have been warned!**

 **Chapter 23**

At some point Dean must have blacked out again.

When he woke, again, feeling like he was suffering from the world's worst hangover, it was to the sound of things being dragged around in the other room.

Samantha dragged one of the single beds that doubled as couches into the bedroom.

"I hear fish sleep with their eyes open." Dean greeted his captor, figuring to keep up the infuriating banter.

Making her mad seemed as good a plan as any, and it gave him something to think about, rather than how much he wanted another taste of her poison.

"Oh, it's not for me" Samantha favoured him with a cutting smile. "I got you a roommate."

When she returned, she was dragging Sam.

Dean lost it.

...

Samantha looked down at him.

"Sam, Sam!" she mocked, as Dean lay panting exhausted by his pointless struggles, she ran a finger through the fresh blood oozing from his bonds.

"I've never had two at once before" she informed him brightly, licking her finger thoughtfully.

"Please! You don't need him, you said he was useless, I'll do whatever you want. Just let Sammy go." Dean's green eyes bounced backwards and forwards between the mermaid and his brother's still form, trying to gauge how hurt Sam was.

Samantha backed off and sat down next to Sam on the bed, running her fingers through his hair like she was stroking a pet dog, but her eyes stayed on Dean and her smile was nasty.

"I don't need him, but I want him. By the time I'm finished with you, you'll both do what I want and you'll be begging me for more."

Sliding off Sam's bed, she returned to Dean, draping herself against him she looked into his eyes.

With a low moan, Dean gave in, leaning in to capture her lips willingly.

Kissing her like he meant it.

An indeterminate time later Samantha broke the kiss and sat up.

"Mmm" she breathed "you really are something else" she licked her lips.

Surreptitiously Deans eyes flicked sideways to Sam's still form

"Image how good it could be if I could use my hands" he rumbled looking up into the mermaid's blue eyes.

…..

"D-n" Sam chose that moment to begin coming too.

"Right here, little bro" Dean cleared his throat "you good?"

"Define good" Sam muttered querulously trying to sit up and finding himself bound.

"Yeah 'bout that... seems your new girlfriend's a mermaid."

Sam rolled his head to look blearily at his brother, taking in the woman perched on the bed next to him.

"Don't mind me" she trilled waving between them "you boys catch up."

Dean shot her a look filled with daggers.

"As I said Samantha here is a soulless mermaid, not a siren like I thought.

She's got the whole poisoned love spit thing goin' on.

But the bronze dagger with your blood did nothing, I nailed her in the heart with it. She seems to like the taste of her victim's blood, so poisoning her with it's a bust..."

"Turns out a couple of months ago, when the sun started to die and the world end... she decided she didn't just want to disappear - She wanted a soul, so she wouldn't just get flushed away, like the giant goldfish she is.

Thanks to Rowena's wee blimey bomb and the residue Chuck didn't clean out, yours truly has been selected for a soulectomy and host transplant." Dean forged ahead with the story over Sam's swearing "seems your blood tastes really good to her Sam, she used the words addictive...isn't that lovely... and while your soul is too shredded for a soulectomy and she doesn't need you...she _WANTS_ you ..."

"As rescue attempts go, yours sucks baby bro. Cos somehow tall blonde and fishy got the drop on you. So here we are. Part of a bad S&M porno starring you, me and fish girl." Dean changed his focus to the mermaid "Did I miss anything, Miss Mackerel?"

Samantha favoured him with a pensive look "Dean you should be nicer to me" she pouted hopping off the bed and approaching Sam.

Again, she stroked Sam's hair, but this time he jerked away.

"Don't you want me Sammy?" She asked sweetly as she held his face in her hands and kissed him deeply, despite his struggles.

When she released him, Sam lay impassively looking up at her, his eyes wide.

"See Dean, that's how you're supposed to do it, no back chat."

Sam gave her a blinding smile "Jess, I've missed you, s-o much" he breathed.

Samantha met Deans eyes and smiled cuttingly, picked up the bronze dagger from the dresser. Unbuttoned Sam's shirt and pulled up the t-shirt beneath laying a shallow cut across Sam's stomach.

Dean swore and thrashed uselessly as he watched his brother frown and blink in surprised hurt, half coming out of his daze.

Then, he gasped, in something totally different as Samantha's tongue lapped across his skin and she sipped at the blood welling across Sam's stomach. Through it all, her eyes were fixed on Deans. Until she swallowed and her eyes rolled back in evident pleasure.

"Be nice to me Dean" the blonde woman purred through reddened lips "I can be your wet dream or your worst nightmare, it's up to you, the same goes for your brother..."

With that Samantha turned on her heel and left the room.

 **A/N: *looks vaguely sick* I know I'm writing this but …. $%££! It seems to be a choice of either write it or have it crawl around in my head. Staggers off to watch some fluffy kitten videos on Youtube.**


	24. Chapter 24

**Chapter 24**

"Sam, Sam, Sammy are you with me over there?" Deans voice broke through Sam's haze.

"Yeah, Dean I'm here" Sam shot his brother a pained, rueful look.

"Sammy that thing isn't Jess ok, not her, don't let her in like that..."

"Not Jess" Sam repeated shifting the piece of aquamarine in his mouth. It seemed to be helping it hadn't stopped his body reacting but his mind was mostly clear. "Yeah Dean I know, look I'm sorry, this is all my fault" Sam tested his bonds. "Man!? Cable ties?" He demanded with a snort of disgust.

"Oh yeah, she's a modern mermaid... none of that old-fashioned ropes of seaweed crap. Straight to the serial killer's best friend"

"None of the other victims were restrained" Sam ventured

"I think we're getting special treatment, extra marinade because the previous Vic's didn't give her what she needed, an' she's running out of time - I think she's finding me a bit difficult, too" Dean sounded smug. "I get the feeling most guys turn to putty after one kiss."

"So, playing hard to get's your big plan?"

Dean let out a theatrical groan "Don't say it Sammy..."

"What...?"

"Hard..."

Sam shot him a bitch-face "Dean, this is serious."

Dean let out a strained chuckle "Trust me baby bro, I get the seriousness of the situation." Dean began working his bindings back and forth. "Bet you're wishing you weren't a sexually repressed Emo right now."

"Bet you're wishing you weren't an over sexed hound dog" Sam shot back beginning to work on his own cable ties.

"What I'm really wishing for, is my hands free and a way to gank the bitch" Dean grated back "please tell me you've got somethin'."

Sam hmphed and blew out an exasperated huff through his straggling hair "Nada."

"So, we're back to bein' dinner and a show. Just for the record Sam, when I rag you to get laid I so didn't wanna be in the room with you while it's happening."

"Jerk!"

"Bitch! Bet Becky would die of disappointment if she knew this was happening and Chuck wasn't around to write about it..."

"My big brother, he can find a silver lining in anything." Sam chuckled despite himself.

"Yep, a sense of humour in the face of a situation that's pretty much a clusterf ck... it's a Thing of Beauty, Sammy... We'll figure it out, ok, we always do."

...

Sam breathed deeply trying to calm his shuddering heart. He was spent, wrung out, plastered with sweat, blood and … other things.

Deans cocky arrogance had dried up hours ago, Samantha was a quick learner she'd worked out Sam was his big brother's weakness and she'd used him, until Dean broke.

In the corner of his mind that was still clear of the mermaid poison, thanks to the fragment of aquamarine, Sam tried to work out some kind of plan.

"I want to keep you both, Sammy. There's a chance big brother, Dean, might come out of the ocean after this." Samantha's voice came from beside him and her hand ran through Sam's hair like she was patting a pet.

Sam shivered ... soulless Dean...having dealt with demon Dean and having been soulless himself for a year, he wondered if Dean dying might be preferable.

"When I have a soul, I'll be able to become the mother of a whole new generation of mermaids ... they could do worse than having you and your brother's genes."

Apparently, things could get worse, being used to father a whole new generation of monsters, was a new twisted depth.

The bite of the bronze knife across his collarbone made him flinch, the cut was only superficial.

He wouldn't bleed out, mores the pity.

The whole sex and blood thing was like a rerun of those months with Ruby. A reminder of one of his biggest mistakes of his life, he could have done without the trip down memory lane. Sam wondered if it was the demon blood taint in him that Samantha couldn't get enough of or if it was something else. He supposed it could just as well be the lingering fragments of angel grace buried in him.

The shock of the mermaid poison and the flood of sensation made him roll his face to the side helplessly. Staring straight into his brothers unseeing green eyes. The shocking blankness in his brother's eyes pushed every sensation from Sam's mind, but terror.

...

"Tonight" Samantha promised him "tonight your brother will give me his soul."

 **A/N: Yeap, I finally slid the title quote into the story**

 **Reviews please! Yeah….. we all know I'll keep writing to get the frogging story out of my head…. but I could viciously stop posting it for a few days, just to give you all a case delayed gratification.**


	25. Chapter 25

Chapter 25

"Sam, Sam" a slap woke Sam from a exhausted doze. He hadn't eaten or drunken anything for more than two days, the mermaid poison, the inability to stretch or move and the multitude of small cuts and bloodletting. None of it was life threatening but the entire weight of everything was beginning to grind him down.

Sam narrowed his eyes feeling pain pounding and drumming in his skull, the sun had barely risen, night was hours away.

Samantha looked down at him frowning in irritation. "Humans are so weak and fragile" she muttered to herself.

The shock of having his arms cut free after so long made him feel almost weightless.

Samantha wrenched him upright.

A bottle of water was thrust in his face grating against his lips and teeth.

"Drink" she ordered tersely.

He gulped clumsily, almost swallowing the fragment of aquamarine before remembering.

"D-n!?" It was a demand and a question.

"Drink, I said" Samantha hissed shaking him.

Sam drunk but his eyes were on the still shape on the bed opposite.

Hell!

He could hardly sit upright unassisted, he was no match for her strength at full capacity and this was far from it, his mind went to the Plum Island autopsy report. That body had been ripped apart, any thoughts of a desperate escape attempt were shattered before he could even try.

The bottle was empty, he felt sick and nauseous but he struggled to keep the fluid down.

"Dean..." his voice was a rusty croak.

Samantha looked angry, "He's alive" the blonde looked like she wanted to hit something. "I want him to stay that way" she spoke the words like they tasted bad "It's his fault, both of your fault. I had to go so far. Why do you have to make this so difficult" she shook him again "You're both so stubborn, weak and pathetic" she raged in fury.

"You -are -going -to -help -me" she snarled "I- need- him- alive- "

Sam wanted to tell her to screw herself but she was telling him to do what he wanted to do, needed to do.

Sam staggered to his feet and stumbled the two steps to where Dean lay.

"He won't drink for me" Samantha shoved a bottle into Sam's hands.

Sam sighed looking down at his brother's face, Dean had a plan.

Yes, Dean would rather die than let the mermaid win.

His wrists were a mangled mess, blood was dried on the cast iron frame and soaked into the mattress. Deans skin was so pale he looked translucent, his lips nearly blue. His skin was clammy and cold. Fine tremors ran through his frame.

"You need to cut him free." He watched numbly as Samantha's pliers cut through the evil cable ties like they were nothing.

Sam dragged his brothers limp form into his lap. Wrapping his arms around him possessively.

"Dean! Dean! Come on wake up" he looked up at the mermaid loathing, anger and helpless worry beating through his body.

"He's too cold, Please, tell me this place has a bath and hot water."

Samantha wrenched Dean out of his arms and dragged him across the floor to the bathroom.

"F ck! look he's not a stuffed toy you psycho, you want him alive" Sam raged.

Samantha shot him a puzzled look, then picked Dean up and Sam realised that, while the creature looked human she really wasn't.

Sam filled the tub with hot water, when Sam stepped back Samantha dropped him in it.

With a strangled yelp, Sam lunged forward barely keeping his brothers head above water.

"Don't ever get a dog" Sam snarled crouched beside his brother holding him upright.

For a second the look on the cool beautiful face reminded Sam of Cas, but Cas had never been this cold, even in the beginning.

As the heat began to work its way in, Dean stirred. Samantha stood in the doorway watching them both as Sam trickled water into his brother mouth stroking his throat to get him to swallowed.

Finally, Deans eyes focused on him, then shot past Sam to the mermaid in the doorway.

"S-mmy?"

"I've got you" Sam stroked his brothers damp hair "I've got you."

Deans throat worked "She's got us both" he rasped struggling weakly against Sam's arms.

Sam dug his fingers into his brother's shoulders holding him still "No, stay, rest"

Deans rolled his head weakly, his eyes met Sam's "Kill me. If I'm dead, she dies, you can survive this."

Sam clenched his jaw shaking his head in denial. "You don't have the only soul in the world Dean, she'll burn through every innocent she can lay her hands on, she's got nothing to lose." His voice failed him for a moment "it has to end tonight."

The green eyes that met his drowned with betrayal. Sam closed his eyes, swallowing the pain.

"If you really want to keep us alive, you need to give us food and water. Keep us warm. Make sure we have frickin' air to breath." Sam glared up at Samantha from where he crouched holding his brother.

"Sam!" His brother rasped pulling himself upright.

Sam pulled himself to his feet placing himself between his brother and the mermaid.

"No! fuck Dean, she wants pets, she's gotta learn to look after them properly. She's killing us."

Sam took another step towards the blonde creature "You say you want to keep us, but you nearly drowned him 5 minutes ago, you're right, we are weak and fragile. First lesson keep our heads above water.

Next, you like the taste of me, fine, I'll feed you, but you have to feed us."

"Sam!" Dean protested.

"I don't think you are really in a position to make demands, Sam" Samantha's voice was brittle.

Sam took another step and reached out to stroke Samantha's cheek and tried to imagine she was Jess for a moment "They're not demands" he sighed, hazel eyes looking down at the image of his first love "they're requests" he took the last step forward and kissed her. Giving himself up to it.

...

"Sam, no!" Dean dragged himself out of the tub and pulled his brother away from Samantha. He slipped and nearly fell but Sam wrapped his arm round him.

"Don't you dare go Stockholm on me little brother" Sam's mouth worked for a second then he shot him a rueful half smile.

"Don't die on me, then." His brother's eyes met the fish woman's "We need some dry clothes, food and bandages."

Sam guided him to sit on the closed toilet lid and handed him a towel.

"Stop giving her lessons on proper care and maintenance of human beings and tell me how we get out of this Sammy" Dean hated how weak he sounded and felt.

"For now, we survive" Sam's voice held very little hope.

"Yeah ok"

Samantha walked back in with a handful of clothing, some of it was theirs, some of it must have been from her previous victims. She handed Sam a med kit then walked out again.

Dean raised an eyebrow at his brother "So you're teaching Flipper new tricks?"

"Don't call her that" Sam warned

"Stockholm much, bro?"

"It's not Stockholm to try NOT to piss off the thing that can tear you limb from limb, it's frickin common sense, Dean!" Sam roughly helped him dress then opened the med kit.

"She's spent more than two days molesting me, molesting you! right there in the same room... she wants to eat my f cking soul Sam! And you want me to be polite to her?!"

"Dean, Amara wanted to eat your soul too and you didn't go out of your way to piss her off."

"What part of Gods frickin sister did you miss Sam? That was different..." Dean found himself trailing off.

Sam just looked at him as he started bandaging his brother's wrists.

"It was ..." Dean hated the sulky tone in his voice watching his brother wrap his wrist then tie it off neatly. Instead of stopping he added several more layers of loose messy bandage over the top building up a layer of short wraps that would come off easily. Realising Sam's plan Dean grinned and met his brother's hazel eyes. Sam was smart, he hadn't given up.

"Now do mine" Sam ordered holding out his wrists.

"In a bit" Dean examined his brother's chest in dismay, "you need a shower first" Sam tensed and Dean could tell the last thing his brother wanted to do was take off his clothes or be that vulnerable.

"It's ok Francis, whatever shreds of virtue you have left…. I'll protect them with my life."

Turning away Dean faced the door.

Sam grunted but stripped and took the worlds shortest shower hissing in pain and the water found all the cuts. When he turned back Sam was wearing a pair of too short jogging pants. Dean got started on Sam's chest and wrists adding extra layers of bandages.

"What now?" Dean watched Sam slide the small pair of medical scissors into concealment. He wasn't sure what Sam thought they'd do that the bronze dagger didn't, but it was something.

"Now we play nice" Sam murmured taking a deep breath and giving his brother a meaningful look.

"I'm not sure I can Sam..." Dean almost begged.

...

Samantha fed them, then Dean watched in horror while Sam fed her.

He found he couldn't look away despite himself.

F ck this was sick, it was sicker that he envied his brother despite himself, Dean bit his lip feeling the thrum of addiction and need burning through his blood, _I'm a junkie_ Dean told himself with self-recrimination.

As if she heard his thoughts Samantha looked up at him with a smile, her lips red with his brother's blood. Sam looked up at him too, "play nice" written on his face, Sam's puppy eyes begged him.

Dean wanted to scream, he wanted to cry, he wanted to die, he wanted to kill monster clasped loosely in his brother's arms.

But mostly now, he just wanted her.

He'd broken in Hell, and now he was breaking again.


	26. Chapter 26

**Chapter 26**

Samantha had started to relax and let her guard down, Sam half sat, half lay on the bed with his hands cable tied to the cast iron bedframe. His feet were free, thank goodness for small mercies.

Dean was only attached to the other bed by one hand now. Not that it mattered. Sam sighed and watched his brothers breathing.

Damn, Sam hoped Dean was just asleep, not spiralling the drain again.

When his brother had stopped fighting Samantha and had become a willing participant, it had been the hardest thing Sam had ever had to witness, not because his brother was making out with someone only feet away and it was a million kinds of wrong to witness your freaking brother doing that.

But because he'd witnessed Dean break. And he, Sam, had asked him to do it, he'd thrown his big brother to a monster that wanted to rip his soul out, with the instructions to give the bitch a good time.

Dean would have never done that to him.

Never.

Samantha walked back into the room and sat down on the bed next to his brother, stroking his hair like he was a pet, again. "He really is beautiful" she mused looking up at Sam "I guess you both are."

Sam wasn't sure what to say, so he stuck with agreeing with her "Yeah, he is" Sam cleared his throat uncertainly "is he asleep... or?"

"Asleep" she confirmed tracing one finger down Deans cheek "I'm old you know, you humans, I've watched your kind since they were little more than animals, we can leave the water for a short time without" she waved her hand implying her current state "I've had plenty of your kind over the years for sustenance and because I was bored, the way you squirm and cry out is amusing... but... this form is different... or maybe he is..." Sam suddenly wondered if his blood was having the same effect on the mermaid as it had on Crowley during the demon trials.

"Do you usually drink blood?" He asked, wanting to know.

At the mention of blood, Samantha licked her lips and looked at him "when we consume humans we usually consume them all, but... if I did that with you... it would be over" she slid off Deans bed and approached Sam, crawled onto his lap and rested her cheek against his chest, kissing the still weeping wound there almost gently. The contact made Sam's breath catch, his heart race and his skin tingle. Samantha cut one of his hands free and Sam found himself stroking her long blonde hair idly while she licked at his skin.

Samantha looked up into his eyes "Touching and being touched feels good" she mused "when your brother touches me, I make the sounds ... like you do."

Sam cleared his throat unsteadily "I'm led to believe my brother is quite good at... uhmm giving pleasure" this was just too bizarre, the mermaid was a sexual predator in every sense of the word, but she was almost innocent.

Right now, relaxed, snuggled against his chest and strung out on his blood the woman seemed harmless and vulnerable.

Eyeing his brothers sleeping form he remembered the accusation of Stockholm syndrome, even with the aquamarine, he wasn't sure how straight his thinking was right now.

Sam had a plan and he needed to move it along.

"Where are the weapons? You shouldn't leave them lying around where people can see them, if people see them, it could cause trouble."

Samantha waved her hand at the other room languidly "They're out of sight, under the sink."

"Oh good" Sam kissed her forehead "that's my girl"

...

"Dean, Dean wake up!"

The day was fading towards sunset, Sam looked anxiously over at his brother. Dean was awake but he just lay there blinking slowly.

"Dean! Dean, come on man, snap out of it!"

"S'mmy?

"Yeah, you need to try and get your head straight Dean."

"L' me 'lone S'mmy. Don' wanna" his brothers reply was sulky and weak.

Samantha was back, Dean looked up at her with a stunning smile, his green eyes brightening. The mermaid smiled back running her hand over him possessively.

"Samantha!" Sam's tone held warning.

"What?!" She snapped back, looking annoyed.

"If you want to keep him, you have to stop. Whatever it is you plan to do with him tonight, he's not going to be in any shape for it."

The look the mermaid shot Sam was full of daggers, she was a spoilt child with a new toy. There was nothing harmless or vulnerable about the snarl she let out, as she crouched over Dean.

Speaking past the alarm of certain death, Sam continued "Look at him, please, he needs a break... you both do. I want you to succeed, if you could, could just leave enough of him behind, so he's still my brother... my souls a wreck, you said it yourself... but I'm alive and maybe he can be too, anything is better than nothing. I need him! Please, please give him a chance " he was openly begging now, words running out in desperation.

Samantha strode across to him in fury, Sam flinched but she simply used her pliers to cut his other hand free.

"You have an hour."

"He could really do with something with a bucket load of sugar and caffeine and more food."

She returned with a can of energy drink and of all things ...pie.

"Pie?" Sam's mouth quirked and he looked at her in wide eyed surprise.

"He said he wanted it"

Sam's frown deepened "You discussed his desert preferences?"

"While he was being...difficult, he said he wanted pie more than me."

Sam couldn't help laughing "Well don't take it too hard, Dean does really love pie."

...

Sam got all of the energy drink down his brother, but only a small amount of the pie, Deans eyes barely left Samantha.

"It's time" the words sent panic through Sam.

"At least let me say goodbye."

Samantha nodded.

Gripping his brothers face in both his hands Sam stared into his brother's eyes.

"Dean, I know you're in there and you're so, so not going to like this."

"But it's all I can give you" Sam swallowed "you need this, if you're going to survive, I need you to come back" Sam bit his lip still searching his brother's eyes "All I can say is, please don't swallow"

Holding his brother as tightly as he could Sam leaned forward and kissed his brother deeply, thrusting his tongue into his brothers mouth and felt the small piece of hardness click against Deans teeth.


	27. Chapter 27

**Chapter 27**

Sam pulled back slightly searching Deans face for awareness.

From inches away, Sam saw the aquamarine take effect, one second Deans eyes were wide and dazed; then his pupils shrunk to pinpricks, before expanding to something more normal.

Deans expression went for stoned and slavish, to a silent shocked look that screamed "Sam? what the fuck!"

Under his hands, Dean tried to backpedal away, lips parted on horror.

But Sam held him, his eyes beseeching him to get with the program.

After two panting breaths, a slight smile curled Deans lips and he gave a fractional nod, his eyes went unfocused again, then Dean turned to look to Samantha like a moth following a flame.

Sam wasn't sure if it had been enough, but for now, it was all he could do.

Sam turned to look at Samantha again "Let me come" he asked, standing and looking down into her blue eyes "I can help you" he pleaded running his hands down her arms.

"No"

"But..." he subsided.

"Just ... please come back to me" he begged "remember what I said, keep his head above water..."

Sam took a deep breath, held Samantha's face in his hands, much like he had done with his brother moments before and kissed her like he meant it.

Taking the hit of mermaid poison unprotected almost dropped him to his knees. He sat suddenly on the bed and held one hand to the bars.

Hoping, praying.

Samantha cable tied his hand to the bed, but didn't attempt to secure his other one. She stroked her hand down his face and he found himself turning towards it and kissing her palm.

Samantha smiled at him and patted his cheek gently "We will be back, Sam."

"I'll be waiting" he gave her a dimpled smile, but couldn't help his eyes flicking to Dean.

...

Samantha took Deans hand and led him from the room.

Sam watched his brother walk away.

It seemed to be his fate, to watch his brother walk away to die and be unable to stop it.

...

 _'Being kissed by your brother isn't the most awful thing to happen here,'_ Dean advised himself, when the shock and the reality came crashing in on him.

He had to admit it was clever, but he was having a hard time not gagging, spitting, swearing or wiping his mouth.

It was something him and Sammy were never going to discuss. NEVER!

Dean prodded the small fragment of the hard thing Sam had slipped him, with his tongue. Whatever it was, it seemed to have sobered him up no end.

"It's all I can give you" ... "you need this" ... "please don't swallow"

Dean didn't know what he was supposed to do, he knew Sam had a plan, but it would have been nice if Sammy had let him in on it.

He followed Samantha away from Sam without a backward glance but he could feel Sam's eyes on him.

"I need you to come back."

...

The sun had set and the moon was a curved arc of brilliance that sent fingers of light dancing over the gentle swell of the ocean.

The tang of salt water and the surge and susurrus of the waves seemed to fill Deans head.

The sand under his bare feet seemed to bleed electricity into him.

Samantha held his hands in hers, looking up into his eyes with a feeling of stillness that was almost hypnotic.

Then, she stripped off her clothes.

She was pale silver in the moonglow, like a statue and despite himself and everything she had done to him; Dean found himself thinking critically this terrible awful creature, was beautiful beyond belief.

When she stripped him of all his clothing except his shorts, Dean didn't resist.

Without a word the mermaid led Dean into the water. With each step into the ocean the chill grew deeper, yet the heat in his blood grew hotter.

Eventually the water covered both them from the shoulders down.

Samantha turned in the lapping water and faced him, there were small pains when her nails embedded themselves into his hands but the pain was a distant thing.

Then she began to sing.

The sound was like a million instruments and a choir of angels captured in a single voice.

It made him want to weep, claw out his own ears and never stop listening, simultaneously.

It was like nothing Dean had ever heard.

If her kiss was like a drug. Her voice was like death and rebirth.

...

Sam counted to 300 in his head, then unravelled the bandages on his wrist to give himself some room to work, slipping the small medical scissors from where he'd hidden them he began to saw at the cable tie attaching him to the bed. The scissors were tiny and blunt and for long minutes Sam despaired ever getting free.

But finally, the tough plastic snapped and he was free.

First item on the agenda achieved, Sam congratulated himself inanely.

The next was more important, moving quickly Sam found his way to the sink and crouched to retrieve all the weapons Samantha had confiscated.

There it was, Deans beloved Grenade launcher.

It wasn't the best plan in the world, but sometimes overwhelming fire power succeeded where simple common sense, research and lore didn't, the story of Bobby dealing with an Okami using a woodchipper was just such a moment.

Sam begged everything holy that grenade launcher would trump immortal mermaid.

Sam broke into a run.

...

Samantha placed her hands on Deans face and leaned in, as if to kiss him.

But instead she opened her mouth breathing in, her hands forcing his jaws apart with casual strength.

Tendrils shot out of her mouth and invading his.

There was a feeling, like tearing inside his chest and a glow seemed to claw its way up from the pain in his chest and fill his mouth.

Samantha's upturned face was lit by the unearthly glow, a look halfway between agony and ecstasy in the eyes that gazed back a Dean.

...

Sam hit the beach at a dead run, the grenade launcher cradled against his chest.

When he fixed on Dean and Samantha in the water, the light flickering and glowing between them his courage faltered, then flared.

With a keening cry Sam sighted the mermaid, praying he wouldn't kill his brother as well.

For a second Sam thought Dean met his eyes.

Then Sam pulled the trigger.

 **.**

 **.**

 **.**

 **.**

Nothing happened.

How could he have missed it? There were no grenades in the f-cking thing.

 **A/N: Blame it on Sweder67! Are you still loving how I work that cliff hanger…..?**

 ***raised eyebrow and smug smirk***

 **Bwhahaha….. I may not enjoy torturing Sam and Dean but I really like torturing ficreaders.**

 **Reviews, Follows and favourites and I'll put us all out of our misery.**


	28. Chapter 28

**A/N: I'm not a b-tch really! Had a migraine yesterday. Couldn't bear to look at the small glowy screen... the author apologises for any discomfort experienced.**

 **Chapter 28**

Sam let the grenade launcher slide from his hands, the only other thing he had was the bronze dagger and Dean had tried it and failed.

Sometimes an instant can last for eternity. This one did, Sam's mind chased every scenario, if he went back to the batch to try and locate the grenades it would be too late, if he tried fighting Samantha with what he did have, he wouldn't win...

In that fraction of a moment the only real choice was made, Sam launched himself into the surf.

...

Past the mermaid's voice, the pain and ecstasy. Dean heard a sound that he'd been trained. all his life to respond to.

Sam's small sound of pain, it was the one that he made when things were really bad.

That sound was hard wired into Deans brain like an instinct, there was no thought involved.

Like reality crashing in, Dean finally became fully aware.

Trying to pull away from the mermaid and break free.

She was too strong.

Then Dean remembered Sam's words

"It's all I can give you, you need this if you're going to survive... please don't swallow"

Whatever it was Sam had slipped him was mermaid poison.

Instead of trying to resist, Dean leant forward and sealed his mouth over Samantha's, spitting the thing into her mouth as hard as he could.

The eyes looking up at him widened in horror, the hands that had held him, instead clawing at her white throat.

Then Sam was there, plunging the dagger into Samantha from behind.

The water was whipped to froth, blood stained the water.

Dean felt his feet go out from under him and he plunged under the water, sucking in a mouthful of water that tasted like tears.

...

Sam saw his brother lean into Samantha as if kissing her. The light that had been flickering between their mouths, was cut off.

Anger and despair bloomed in Sam's heart.

He was too late; his brother's soul had been sucked away and it was all his fault.

Sam plunged the dagger into the mermaid.

It was too late, but he could at least get revenge, or maybe, get Samantha to kill him too.

He'd count that as a win, if Dean was gone.

The water whipped to foam and blood stained the water.

Dean flew backwards and went under.

F cking lying mermaid she was going to let Dean drown, like all the others.

Sam plunged under searching for his brother.

Grabbing hold of his cold slippery brother, he hauled him back to oxygen.

Dean coughed up a mouthful of water, for a moment he just clung to his little brother heaving for breath.

Then Dean pushed away and grabbed for the mermaid pulling her against him.

Samantha spoke, but Sam couldn't hear her over the splintering of his heart, his brother was gone, the thing that was left just looked like him.

...

Breathing was the most beautiful thing Dean had ever experienced.

Sam was ok.

Deans eyes found Samantha in the water.

Letting go of Sam and finding his feet, Dean grabbed Samantha and pulled her against his chest. Looking down into the blue, blue eyes.

"Head 'bove water" she breathed blood trickling from her lips as she formed a partial smile.

"You don't love me..." the accusation held no heat, more like a statement of wonder.

Dean held her close "love and lust are two different things sweetheart, you can't tie someone to a bed and drug them to get them to love you..." Dean swallowed past the lump in his throat.

"Glad..." Samantha's hand reached up and stroked his cheek.

Dean felt a tear run down his cheek.

"Couldn't, couldn't love me... no room... Sam... sam..." blood bubbled weakly from her mouth.

"Shhh" Dean leaned forward and kissed her lips to stop the words.

Pulling her body closer Dean carried her to the beach.

...

Kneeling in the sand either side of her Sam and Dean looked down. Dying Samantha had returned to her true form.

From the waist-down, she was all iridescent scales in changing blues, like her eyes.

She was beautiful, whatever else she was and had been.

For the first time, Samantha's eyes left Deans face and she looked up at Sam.

"Co-ldn't ... c-mp-t- ...alw-ys ...l-ved... y-u..." more blood dribbled from her perfect lips. "lucky!" Samanthas hand tried to reach up to his face "soo ... s-rry" her eyes held regret and guilt. "T-ke care o' y-r broth..."

Sam nodded, as those perfect eyes slid closed and she died.

As they knelt there looking down, Samantha's body began to dissolve.

Soon she was nothing but seafoam, then that was gone too.

Only a fragment of aquamarine lay in the sand.

Both boys sat staring at it for long moments.

Then Dean leant forward and picked it up, looking down at the tiny sliver of blue for long moment. Dean shrugged, handing it to his brother, Dean climbed to his feet and gave Sam a hand up.


	29. Chapter 29

**Chapter 29**

Dean went to collect his clothes and Sam went to retrieve the grenade launcher. Dean didn't say a word about the grenade launcher but he raised an eyebrow in surprise, they were both soaked freezing and exhausted, questions could wait.

The thing about hunts is even once the monster of the week is dead there's always a bucket load of work to do, Dean pushed his brother towards the bathroom with orders to get warm and cleaned up, Sam looked like he wanted to object for a moment, but followed orders.

Sammy looked really unhappy, it was there even in the way he breathed.

Dean figured that after what they'd both been through, they both had a right to be more than a bit unhappy... however, the job came first, everything else worked around it or got shelved.

Dean towelled off roughly and got dressed, putting on his boots felt like putting on armour after so many days of vulnerability.

Dean was surveying the shack with a practiced eye, working out what to dispose of and what to leave, when Sam returned with the med kit.

"Dean, you should..." Sam subsided "well at least let me look at your wrists"

"I'm fine, let's just get this dealt with and get out o' here."

Sam shot him another 'look' and again didn't argue.

Dean struggled with the growing worry for his brother and ruthlessly shelved everything in favour of dealing with the job at hand.

...

 _'My brothers got no soul',_ the thought was tearing Sam apart, every time Sam looked at his brother's cool emotionless face, fear and grief twisted inside him.

As they worked together sanitising the evidence, Sam tried and failed to simply exist in the moment.

The mattress from the bed had to go for a start, soaked as it was with Deans blood. Sam swallowed thickly as they hauled the mattress and the small pile of Samantha's possessions down to the beach to burn, none of this was fair, you'd think after all these years, he Sam, would have got used to the unfairness of life.

When Dean returned with the impala and the prerequisite cans of accelerant and salt, Sam was still looking for the grenades, when he told Dean what he was doing Dean looked slightly bemused and shrugged.

"Leave 'em Sam, we can get more, let's go light this candle and get the hell out."

As the flames rose into the night, Dean handed Sam a bottle of beer, they sipped in silence side by side, each occupied with their own thoughts.

Then Dean cleared his throat and raised his beer.

"To Samantha, the world's most terrifying guppy, where ever you went, I hope you found peace."

Sam shot his brother a sick look but raised his beer and repeated

"To Samantha." He exhaled in pain. G-d Sam hoped if stealing Deans soul sent her anywhere, he hoped it was to eternal torment.

The flames burnt down slowly, finally they could bury anything the flames didn't destroy.

"Well that's it then" Dean rumbled as they walked back to the beach shack. Then he stopped dead his eyes almost bugging out.

"What?" Sam queried in concern.

Dean gestured to the old bike leaning against the wall.

Sam blinked confused.

Dean gestured and then started laughing "Fish, fish riding a, a bicycle!"

It took Sam's battered brain a moment to catch up, and when he did, joy shattered through him.

Because it was so stupid and infantile, and so, so Dean! And no one without a soul could find it that funny.

Sam found himself laughing too.

In the life, they lived.

A sense of humour in the face of situations that were pretty much a cluster$&#%... That, truly was, A Thing of Beauty.

 **A/N: Well, the question is, do I leave it there or do I give the boys that fluffy sandcastle building scene?**

 **Gahds! This has been a hard journey for me, I can't work out if I loved it or hated it *shakes head* I've been told that once you write fanfic there is no escaping back to the sanity of the real world.**

 **There is something bubbling in the back of my head but I think I might be able to repress it if I try hard enough.**

 **The question is does this story make me a real ficwriter or just a wannabe who should leave the sandbox to the big kids? Let me know, I trust your opinion!**

 **ngregory763, Kathy, SpnKs15, NightReader22, DeanSavesSammy, Dragonsrule18, KiaOraToGube, Ameliacareful, Sweder67, Raven-Phoenix... thankyou sooooo sooo much for your reviews you are all my favourites, and I couldn't have gotten through it without you. *Hugs***


	30. Chapter 30

**Chapter 30**

 **(Epilogue and obligatory fluffy scene)**

Sam was frowning at the laptop again, Dean could almost see smoke rising from his ears. Sammy was trying to work things out and understand, and that was all fine and good. But in this case Dean wasn't sure Sam was ever going to get satisfactory answers.

Was it the aquamarine?

Was it drinking so much of Sam's blood? had she gotten a dose of humanity, like some blood born illness like hep C?

Was it the bronze dagger and Sam's blood, had the stuff off the floor just not been effective?

Was it as simple as time running out?

Or, and this one, Dean found the most uncomfortable of all, was it like in the Hans Christian Anderson fairy-tale. Did she die because the object of her desire loved another?

That last one was just bloody stupid, no matter what the mermaid had said.

Dean couldn't deny he loved his kid brother, but only an idiot would think it was, well... you know... Because love was very different than Love... Wasn't it?

Dean scrubbed at his lips with the back of his hand thinking sullenly that he was immensely glad Chuck was on a road trip with Amara, and not writing 'Winchester gospels.'

For Dean, it was easy to let it go, shove it all in another box marked "leave me the f ck alone" and kick it to the back of his head, with the growing collection of its brethren, if things got too restless back there, Dean was fully prepared to drown the lot in copious amounts of whiskey.

Sam on the other hand couldn't help picking at it like a kid with a scab.

Striding over Dean shut the laptop firmly, making his brother yelp in surprise.

"Come on Sammy, we've gotta go"

"We hitting the road?" Sam frowned at him, looking a bit puzzled.

"Just come on bitch, we got stuff to do."

"I w-as doing stuff, Jerk" Sam argued, waving irritably at his laptop.

"Yep, but that can wait, daylights burning, move your shaggy butt."

Sam followed reluctantly between bitchy glares, which his big brother magnanimously ignored.

...

The sea and sky filled the impala's windscreen, sun glinting off black paintwork buffed to midnight blue by the arc of cerulean above. The sound of the ocean and the cry of seabirds as they dashed back and forth between the lapping waves seeped into the silence left by Baby's stilled engine.

For a second the memory of a night-time sea, with moon above, threatened to drown him, but Dean pushed it aside and looked across at his little brother.

"Uhm Dean..." Sam looked back puzzled, the confusion made his brother smile, _yeah this is right_ , Dean told himself with a nod.

Dean pushed the door open and slid out, enjoying the satisfying sound and solidity that was part of his number one girl. Grabbing the chiller, he looked back at his confused brother with a grin.

"You comin' or what Sammy?"

"Where?" Sam looked like a confused retriever and Dean had to fight the urge to tussle his kid brother's hair.

"See that yellow stuff, it's called sand, the sorta shiny blue stuff, is water... it's called a beach Sam."

"I'm not an idiot, Dean." Sam grumbled getting out and doing a 180 of the view.

"And today, we're gonna build a sandcastle." Dean continued sliding his eyes sideways to his brothers face for a reaction.

"A..."

"Sandcastle" Dean finished for him.

"Awww come on Dean..."

Dean let out a long-suffering sigh "Come on Sammy…...Ya know Sam, I've never built a sandcastle" his green eyes looked up into Sam's hazel ones and for a moment Sam saw a much younger Dean, one with blonde hair and freckles holding his own, once very small hand … _'come on Sammy.'_

Sam felt a smile shape his mouth and he let go for a moment "Yeah, okay... you know I don't think I've ever built a sandcastle either..."

The smile Dean shot him was beautiful "Really? Not even at Stanford, with Jess' or somethin'?"

"Nah..." Sam swallowed back the comment about it being kids' stuff and just shared a smile with his brother.

"Ok then!"

...

In the end, it was far from kids' stuff.

After much debate and good natured squabbling, involving a lot of the words "Bitch" and "Jerk," a plan was laid.

Because Sam was involved it had to resemble an actual piece of American architecture.

Because Dean was involved it had to be a towering marvel designed to be seen from space, or at least a fair way down the beach.

Shovels and buckets were required, boots and shirts discarded and jeans rolled up, every so often a hoot of laughter, flying sand or a bucket of sea water would make the birds along the shore take flight in surprise. Scolding in annoyance at the invaders.

The cooler emptied slowly of beer and snacks as things proceeded, which possibility accounted for why some parts needed rebuilding, a few times.

More than a few hot women in bikinis stopped to marvel at the sight of two grown men industriously creating the huge sand edifice. Quite a few of them were enjoying the view of more than just the sea or the sandcastle.

Today however, Dean didn't even spare them a glance.

Three hours later it was done.

A man walking his golden Labrador, answered the call and snapped a few photos with the offered cell phones, amused by the two men standing side by side behind the giant thing, grinning like loons and looking for all the world like two kids on their first beach trip.

"Building a sandcastle ticked off the bucket list, with extreme prejudice, I might add. That puppy's a thing of beauty"

Looking over his shoulder one last time, Sam ruffled his hair trying to get the worst of the sand out, as they walked back to where the impala waited.

"Thanks for this Dean, it was cool."

"It was awesome" Dean favoured his brother with a lazy grin "and I'm an awesome big brother, don't ya forget it Sammy!"

"And soo modest" Sam groused, shoving Deans shoulder.

...

Jodie Mills was having a bad day, there were days when being Sheriff was just one problem after another, and they all ended up on her desk. Jodie knew you couldn't keep everyone happy all the time, but today it seemed she couldn't make anyone happy.

Then she'd got home, and walked into World War III between Alex and Claire, damn she loved those girls but there were days when she really thought she'd bitten off more than she could chew.

Two doors slammed and Jodie sighed. All she'd managed was to make both girls mad at her, as well.

After pouring herself a glass of wine Jodie slumped at the kitchen table head in her hands.

Her phone beeped and she stifled a groan, _what now?_

Jodie looked down at the photo, a tired smile crept its way onto her face.

Sam and Dean Winchester grinned back at her from the photo flanked by a giant sandcastle. "Our first sandcastle!" The subtitle proclaimed.

Jodie tapped her thumb against the side of her phone grinning back at the photo, downing her glass of wine she squared her shoulders and went to knock on bedroom doors. At least she had an icebreaker now.

...

Castiel was having a bad day, he knew Crowley was a demon, the King of Hell, no less, _'and don't ever forget it'_. But why did he have to be so, very, annoying. He wished Crowley would just be quiet for a bit.

His phone blipped to notify he had received a message.

It was a photo of Sam and Dean standing behind a three-foot-high copy of the Capitol Building made of what appeared to be sand.

"Our first sandcastle"

Crowley leaned over Cas's shoulder to peer at the screen. For a moment, Cas felt like snapping "Personal space" like Dean was always doing to him.

"So, that's what Moose and Squirrel get up to while their betters are working" Crowley griped pulling out his own phone and checking his messages. "Why don't I get road trip photos from Bevis and Butthead?" There was a definite whine in his tone.

"I think, that would be because, they consider me to be their friend, and you are just what can be described as a work acquaintance."

Crowley's mouth clicked shut and for the next two hours he didn't say a word.

A small smile curved Castiel's vessels lips as he surveyed the photo again.

Sam and Dean always had a way of saving him.

...

Mary Winchester looked down at the picture on her cell phone, running a finger over the two faces that grinned back at her.

She wondered why Deans hair was blonde, it reminded her more of 'her Dean', all constant chatter and freckles. She thought she saw something of 'her wee Sammy' in the dimples and smile.

They were her boys.

"Our first sandcastle" the text proclaimed, with all the pride and joy of two small boys.

Maybe her little boys were still in there after all, she hadn't missed everything after all.

With a sweet smile, Mary Winchester held her phone to her heart, feeling something loosen in her chest.

Tomorrow was another day and it was nearly time she found her way home, to her boys.

 **A/N: Well there you go, one sandcastle scene and associated fluff.**

 **Please please please feed me a few more reviews. Think of it as a doggy bag to comfort me back in that nasty thing called real life.**

 **Thanks for joining me along the way, I love you all *hugs***

 **MC2**


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